Re:Member Core Doctrines IV
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
eah, I did that two weeks in a row. It's not a good start. All right. We are, as Matt said, we're working through our membership commitment, which is kind of uncommon for us normally. We're working through books of the Bible. We just finished First Samuel. We're going to pick up and go through Second Samuel next year. Don't cheer too loudly. I know you're super excited. You're like, I want to know what happens. Well, we're going to get there. But right now we're working through our membership commitment and we're trying to say, where do these truths come from if we're going to commit to these as a church, if this is going to guide us as how we're going to make disciples and how we're going to have life together? Where did we get that? And we are walking through each of these points and then looking at the Scriptures. If you want to grab a Bible and go to Matthew chapter 28, that's where we'll begin. But we are going to move all over the place this morning.
During World War II in 1941, the Ford Motor Company built the Willow Run plant right near Detroit, Michigan. It was about a mile long. And they were building B24 Liberator heavy bombers. That's an actual picture of the plant and where they were assembling them. They were assembling those one every 63 minutes was coming off the line. That's like a squadron of bombers a day just in that one plant. Now, in order for them to do that, they needed to have the right equipment. They needed to have the right people. The right people with the right equipment needed to be doing the right job. And in order for them to go as long as they did and as quickly as they did and as well as they did, they needed to know the purpose. They needed to know why it was worth the energy, the effort, the time, the focus in order to do this. And in some ways, I feel like that's what we're looking at when we look at commitment six and seven for us today, which we're going to look at those two, is that we, as a church, God has designed his church to function where they are equipped and working together for a purpose. And that's what we're going to look at this morning.
So commitment number six for us is I have been sealed by the Holy Spirit for salvation and empowered by him for mission and service. Now, we looked at sealing by the Holy Spirit for salvation last week. So we're going to start with and empowered by him for mission and service. That the Spirit has empowered us, has equipped us for what we need to do what God has called us to do. So Matthew 28. Look at verse 18. It says.
> And Jesus came and said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age."
So that the church is commissioned. This is the Great Commission, where Jesus says, this is what you're supposed to do. This is the purpose. This is what I'm sending you out. That you would go and make disciples, that you would bring people into what it looks like to follow me, just as I've brought you into it. And then he says, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age, that Jesus is going to be with them, to empower them to accomplish what he sent them out to do. And the way that he does that is through the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God or the Spirit of Christ. It's referred to Jesus says that he's going to send the Spirit. It says that the Spirit proceeds from the Father, that we've got the Holy spirit, Spirit.
Acts 1:8. This is what he says to the same group, same disciples. He says,
> But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.
So they're going to be empowered. That's why we use that word. We're empowered by the Spirit. They're going to be empowered. They're going to receive power, and they're going to receive power for a purpose. He says, you're going to receive power from the Spirit. And he doesn't just stop. He says, and you'll be my witnesses that this Spirit is going to empower what he's called them to do. If you showed up for your first day at work, they sat you down in the office and they gave you three pool noodles and a sword, you'd have some real questions about what your job was. But if you come in and they give you the exact equipment that you need for the job that you're going to do, it makes sense. And so when the Spirit empowers us, he's empowering us for what God has called us to do, for what he's equipped us to do, what he's sending us out to do.
So in Acts 2, 8 2, 38. Peter says this while he's preaching, and it's a helpful clarification for us to understand. Says,
> And Peter said to them, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."
so that the Spirit is received upon conversion. That when we place faith in Jesus, when we repent, when we're baptized, when we're following him, that the Spirit then goes to work in us. We're not waiting for some later manifestation of the Spirit or some later filling of the Spirit, but that we are equipped with the Spirit. The Spirit comes in when we're sealed for salvation. We're also empowered for the work that he's called us to. And this is going to be referenced throughout the New Testament letters. We're going to look at Romans 12 together. First Corinthians 12 also speaks of this, and it's Ephesians 4 talks about it, but it says Romans 12 having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them. So if you're a Christian, the Spirit has sealed you for salvation. Spirit's at work in your belief, and the Spirit is at work in empowering you to fulfill the calling placed on the church. But we have gifts that differ. Now they're gifts given to us by grace, meaning we haven't earned them. They've been granted to us through the grace of Christ and through the work of the Spirit, but they're different. So there are some things that you are good at, empowered by the Spirit intentionally for the sake of the work of the church. And there are some things that you're bad at. And that's just how it works. And there's some people around you who are good at something else because we differ in this. But he says, let us use them.
> Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; if service, in his serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; the one who exhorts, in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in generosity; the one who leads, with zeal; the one who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness.
So you are gifted and you should use your gifts for something. And we see this right? You see this in the church. This is actually one of the reasons why we exist in community groups. We're just trying to practice together as a church, what it looks like to be Christians. So in your community group, you're meant to bring the work of the spirit in you for the sake of the good of your group. This is why it matters. If you're consistently not there, that means there's work of the spirit that's consistently not there. This is why it matters. When your group says, hey, we're going to go do this as a mission effort, or we're going to go do this as a serving effort, and you just don't show up, that matters because the spirit empowers you for work, for service, for mission. But you see this in your group, right? There are some people in your group who, when they're like, hey, let's all go do this. Everybody all goes and does that. And they're somehow gifted to get people to lead, to get people to come along with them. And there are other people who are like, we're going to go this way. And they just head off by themselves. And it's like, hey, let's. Maybe that's not the thing that you're the best at. There's some people who, if they throw a party and they invite people, everybody shows up. My brother was like that. He could throw a party. He could get everybody to come. He wouldn't talk to them once they were there. Wasn't his thing. He was bouncing around, doing other stuff. There are other people who. They can't. They're not good relationally, socially getting everybody around. But when you're at a party. I was talking to some group leaders today. They were talking about this. They said, this person in our group, they can get people. And then they said, and I just show up and start talking to those people about Jesus. And that's my job. He said, I'm kind of feel a little socially awkward anyway, so conversation with me is going to be uncomfortable. Might as well be about Jesus. So he's just in there asking questions, talking to people. He said, that's what he feels gifted to. Do you know that there are people in your group, when somebody cries, everybody else just kind of looks at this person like, you gonna make them feel better? There are other people in your group who, when they go to encourage you, it's not encouraging. They're like, that's all right. One day you'll die. It's like, that doesn't. I don't feel better. Were you trying to make me feel better? Like, and we have gifts that differ, and we're meant to use these for the sake of building one another up. We're meant to use them. So if you were to say, well, I don't really have anything. The New Testament's going to say that you're wrong and that you're actually being a poor steward. What God has given you first.
First Peter four says it this way, as each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. That we are empowered for mission and service.
> As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God's varied grace.
Now, we're going to talk more about mission in a moment, because that's going to show up again in seven, in our seventh commitment. But we're empowered for service, that there are things that are meant to be used for the edification of the church, for building one another up in love. And if you aren't doing anything and saying, well, I don't really think I'm gifted, I would tell you that the reason you don't think you're gifted is because you aren't doing anything. You all know when Superman found out he was bulletproof is the first time someone shot him. That's how he figured that out. That's how that works. That the Spirit has empowered us for the work that he's called us to. But if we don't ever go and we don't ever serve and we don't ever try and we don't ever know, he's not empowering you to sit at your house by yourself watching tv. That's not the thing that is empowered in us. He's empowering us as we go, while we walk in faith, while we go into missionary efforts, while we go into service effort, while we talk to someone who's struggling, while we pray with somebody. He empowers us as we go, and then we begin to learn what it is that he's gifted us to do. This is why you should try things. This is why you should serve. This is why you should ask the Christians around you, am I any good at that? This is why when someone asks you that, you should tell them the truth. No, I'll tell people. Sometimes I think if you really desire that, you can get better at it. Sometimes we'll say, hey, because we believe the Spirit has gifted you somewhere, we don't mind telling you we don't think this is it, y'. All. I spent one summer serving with children. I just felt called into ministry. I was like, I'm gonna go serve with kids. That was the last summer I ever spent serving with children. I've gotten a little bit better at it now that I have children, but only in, like, select circumstances, like when I'm coaching and I can make you run, but, like, you go Try some things, go have some people witness and tell you and help you along in it. But we are meant to go and we're meant to steward it. And if you were saying, well, I don't really have anything, that's actually an accusation against the work of the Spirit, his goodness and his grace. So let's be good stewards and let's go. Let's begin to serve, let's begin to labor, let's begin to work. When you show up to your group, start asking them, are there things I'm good at? Are there things you've find encouraging or helpful? Or the things that I should be doing? And start intentionally putting forth effort to serve and to build up your group. And it matters if you're there or not there. And it matters if you're pulling weight or not pulling weight. But there's something beautiful that happens as we do that together. I feel like that every once in a while when my group eats a meal together. It's actually like this beautiful picture of what the church is. Because all I brought was taco shells, but someone else brought meat and someone else brought cheese and someone else brought lettuce. And together we've made something beautiful, a taco, something wonderful. But if somebody doesn't show up and they're the meat person, it's like, get them on the phone. What are you talking about? You're not showing up. I'm eating shell with cheese and lettuce. Have you lost your mind? But that's the way it works with the church. That when we aren't participating, we lose something. Okay, I've said enough of that. Here we go.
Number seven. Jesus will return to rescue his church and judge his enemies. Those who have trusted in something or someone other than Jesus will be separated from God for eternity. As a part of God's church, I'm sent to proclaim the gospel so that as many as possible might be saved. And through Jesus. Now it feels like a shift. And it is from. From our commitment number six to commitment number seven. But commitment number six, part of the reason we wanted to carry walk through these together is a number six says, the Spirit's empowered us for what God's called us to do. And then number seven begins to clarify, what is that? What is it we're supposed to be doing? Why are we building one another up in love? Why are we loving one another? Well, why are we caring for one another? It's so that the church might move forward and see people come to know Christ, so that we might see disciples made. So we're going to walk through this piece by piece and try to understand, where does this come from? So it says, Jesus will return to rescue his church and judge his enemies. This is often referred to as Judgment Day. The Bible calls it the Day of the Lord. We'll refer to it as the Day of Wrath, the day of Jesus Christ. Or often just that day, the day or that day that there is coming. A day, a moment in history when Christ returns. And when he does, there is judgment. Jesus will speak about this. Jesus actually says that on that day, people will be held accountable for every word they use. Acts 17, 30 and 31. Paul preaching says,
> The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.
And of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead, so that God in Christ is the righteous judge. That Christ will judge all of humanity down to everything we've ever done that's coming.
First Peter four, five, he says,
> They will give an account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.
Now, this day is distinctly different, depending on whether or not you belong to Christ or you don't. And so I want to, as Christians, point out, that this is a day of joy for us.
Romans 5 says this.
> Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.
So that the Day of Wrath is a day of salvation for those who are in Christ. If we've been justified by his blood, if we've been made right by his blood, if you've trusted in the blood of Christ to cover you where it says that there's a proclamation of forgiveness of sins, if we're trusting in the forgiveness of sins through the work of Jesus, then on the Day of wrath, we are saved from wrath. It's a day of salvation. Second Thessalonians puts it this way in chapter 1, verse 10.
> when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, and to be marveled at among all who have believed, because our testimony to you was believed.
So that on that day of salvation, the Church marvels and Christ is glorified. And I always feel like John Piper is very helpful in These kind of passages. So I looked to see. I was like, I'm sure he has something to say about this. So I went to see if he did, and he did. And here's what he said, and I thought it was helpful. He says, what is marveling? Another word for marveling is being amazed. Amazement and marveling are not thoughts, their emotions. If you see something marvelous and you feel nothing, you're not marveling. I don't care what you think. If you see something amazing and you don't feel any amazement, you're not amazed. Marveling is a feeling. Being amazed is a feeling, not a mere thought. And I think that's helpful, and I think it's true. I think he's onto something here, that we feel it. You're either amazed or you're not, but you feel it. You have this moment of. Catches your breath that you lose yourself for a moment, and it's something that happens inside of you. That's why you ever tell a joke. And I mean, I do this. I tell jokes a lot of all the people around me, unfortunately, if you're going to be around me, I'm going to make jokes about things. But I'll be around people sometimes and they'll go, that's funny. And it's like, well, then laugh. You must not have thought it was funny. You just made a comment on the humor of it. And that's what A little bit like, you ever tell somebody really good news and they're like, that's wonderful. And it's like, wrong. You've done this wrong. That's not how you respond to good news. You should feel something. You should respond better. And that's some of what he's saying, is that when this happens, it'll be something we feel. He goes on, he says, well, what kind of feeling is it? It's a good feeling. People pursue amazement, they pursue marveling. That's why we go to the mountains and the canyons. That's why we get out of the city light so that we can see the stars. People pay money to be amazed, to marvel. It's a good feeling. It's a desirable feeling. It's a species of pleasure, joy, gladness, and satisfaction. So he's just looking at this passage and he's saying, when Jesus shows up in the church, marvels, it means they feel something wonderful. And y', all, as Christians, and I feel like Christians understand what I'm talking about. You've had those moments you couldn't describe, but you wouldn't. You couldn't talk, tears just ran down your face. You just had these moments where you were caught by the beauty and the glory and the goodness of Christ. These moments when you were overwhelmed by it. And what it's saying is that when he arrives, all of Christianity, everyone who belongs to Jesus, is just going to go, it's here. He's here. The moment has come and we're going to feel it. John Piper goes on to say that God will get the glory and we will get the joy, and that in our joy he will be glorified. That's what's happening on that day. And this is why Jesus is going to use language like he's the groom coming for his bride. It's going to be these pictures of joy, of love, wonder. And this looking forward to this day offers us comfort in the middle of difficulty, when we're facing trials we can remember. I know where this goes is what we're saying about. I know how this story ends. It comforts us. It also calls us to endurance. This ought to help you say no to sin. There are times when I think, no, I have a Lord. I can't just do what I want. And I'm going to stand before him one day and I'm going to give an account. I can't just chase after the things I desire. I have a king. But it also gives us endurance in the midst of trial and persecution. We know where this is going and that the Lord sets it all right. But throughout the Scriptures, there is clear and compelling and startling language given to this day of judgment. Clear and compelling and startling language. So I want us to consider those who have trusted in something or someone other than Jesus will be separated from God for eternity. Those who have trusted in something or someone other than Jesus will be separated from God for eternity. I'm now going to read two passages. We're just going to try to take them in. The first is Jesus speaking about this day. It's found in Matthew, chapter 25. He says,
> "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.' Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?' And the King will answer them, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.' Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.' Then they also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?' Then he will answer them, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.' And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."
Jesus says, there's a day when the Son of man will come and the glory of his angels will sit on the throne and he'll separate and everyone will head eternally in one direction or the other. This is the way 2 Thessalonians says it, this is the evidence of the righteous judgment of God that you he's writing to this church in Thessalonica may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are also suffering. Since indeed God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us. When the Lord Jesus is revealed. So he's saying on the day of Christ, when he's revealed, there will be relief and affliction when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming the fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
> and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.
We're told that no one comes to the Father except through the Son, so that in order to know God, you have to know Christ. Jesus says, if you reject Me, you reject him who sent me. So to know God is to know Christ, to know God through Christ. And he says, do not obey the gospel. I think that's helpful when you consider what we just read in Matthew, that the Gospel is the news that there's forgiveness of sins proclaimed in the name of Christ, that we would submit to and repent in light of what Jesus has done, and then walk in obedience so that all those things that he talks to the righteous about in Matthew 25 show up. Because we're following Jesus in obedience to the Gospel. So it's not a list of ways that you earned it. Jesus has qualified us through his death and resurrection. His blood has covered us. That's what he said. If we made, if we're justified by his blood, how much more will we be saved from the wrath of God? So that it's work of Jesus that saves us. But it shows up in how we live. And there is a moment when people are separated. Those who knows Christ and those who do not, verse 9. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints and to be marveled at among all who have believed they will suffer the punishment, eternal destruction. This is what the Scriptures teach. This is what we believe. That there is a day where Jesus Christ, as the King of all things, judges the world, and that the stakes for that day are eternal. But at that moment, there is nothing left to do but to be sorted and evaluated, welcomed and cast out. And as we look forward to this day as Christians, and as we look to it as a day of joy, and as we look to it as a source of comfort and a call to endurance, it also should give rise to such compassion in our hearts that drives us into Willing, delighted obedience to proclaim this message, because we should not want to see any cast out.
So as a part of God's church, I am sent to proclaim the gospel so that as many as possible might be saved through Jesus. What we're saying is we understand this reality and we're supposed to go. It's what we say every Sunday when we're finishing up some version really of this. Our world is broken and marred by sin. The people around us are caught in it, in despair and headed towards destruction. And that Jesus tell us, tells us that judgment is coming. But we know that there's salvation in him and him alone. So empowered by the Spirit, you are sent. The church is plan A for this message. There is no plan B. We talk through this every week. We remember this every week because there are people around us who are going to be sorted with the goats on that day. So Jesus in Luke 24 says,
> and said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem."
But there's a proclamation of the hope of the gospel that is to be sent forward. Acts 10. This is Peter speaking. He says,
> And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead.
That we're commanded. Peter says, we were. He's talking about the. The disciples. But all of us that follow after them are commanded to proclaim this news that Jesus is the one who's going to judge and that there's forgiveness and hope in his name. Second Peter 3. He says,
> The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.
There are moments when you think, I just wish the Lord would come back. I wish he would end this. I wish he would come get us. And in those moments, I want you to hear the voice of the Spirit say, he's not slow, he's patient. And there are more who need repentance. He's not slow, he's patient. And there are more who need repentance. The message hasn't gone far enough yet. It hasn't reached them yet. He's got some that are going to believe at the message that's proclaimed and are going to marvel and weep and dance for joy on that day, but they don't know yet. And he says, but the day of the Lord will come like a thief. We won't see it coming. Two weeks ago they said the Rapture is coming. I don't know if y' all heard that. No, it wasn't. That's not how it works. Facebook won't know about it. It's going to come like a thief. It's going to catch us off guard. But then the heavens will pass away with a roar and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.
Why are we empowered? Why are we equipped? Why did they build a mile long factory? Because they were at war. And y', all. We should not be any less focused than someone who's building a bomber to fight Hitler. We should not be any less focused. We should not have any less ability to understand the purpose of what God has called us for. We should not lose sight of what really matters. Because there is going to be a day, and on that day, there's going to be a lot of things that do not matter. And there's going to be one thing that really, really does. Do you know Christ? Have you surrendered? Have you repented? Have you been saved by his blood? That's going to matter. But there's a whole lot of things that we focus on, spend time on, have energy in that do not matter. And we say things like, I don't know, it's been really busy. I don't know. It's hard for me to read. I don't know. I just feel so awkward. I don't. You know, I just. Bible's always been kind of confusing to me. Somebody's saying, hey. You say, hey, you need to be trying to build with people and share the Gospel. And it's like, well, I just don't know what to say. Then you say, well, read your Bible. Yeah, but it's hard for me to read. Okay. Didn't you quote stats to me about a sports team? Did you make those up or did you read them and memorize them? I don't know. I just kind of. It's hard. I'm busy. I can't. I can't make it consistently to this. I can't be a part of mission stuff. Okay. Do you miss a workout? Do we know what matters? Do we know that there is a day that will be to the glory of Christ, but there will be judgment on that day? Y' all have neighbors that don't know Jesus. Do I care or am I busy?
As I was working on this and considering It I was considering how our groups function. We meet with one another and we have time where we're intentionally. We're just trying to practice what it means to be Christians, trying to practice what it looks like to follow Jesus. So we study the Bible together. We're not just a Bible study, but we study the Bible because Christians study the Bible. We eat a meal. It's not just about eating a meal, but we belong to each other. So we share a meal. We confess sin, we encourage one another, we ask, how's your life going? And we have a section in our normal group rhythm that's called Review the Mission, where we ask, who are you building with? How's that going? Who are you sharing the gospel with? And I've been considering recently that we have care nights. So if you're not in a group, there's a thing called a care night. If you're in a group, you know what I'm talking about. We sit and we say, how are you doing? Where do you need to repent? Where do you need to believe the Gospel? And I know as a group leader that if someone just said consistently was like, nah, oh, I don't do this. This isn't my thing. Or when we went around and we said, how are you doing? They just went, you know, basically some form of pass. We would be telling them, hold on a second. No, you. You need to understand how Christ interacts with your life. You need to know that you have sin, you need to confess, you need to walk in openness, you need to be rescued, you need to be redeemed. Like, we'd be pressing on this, but I started realizing that they're consistently. I feel like our group sometimes when it comes to considering mission, we just kind of. I don't have anything to say because that's not really a thing I do. And we need to have the same understanding. If that's not acceptable for people who know this, you have nobody in your life that you're praying for, that you're going out of your way for that. You care about meeting Christ? Nobody. Then find somebody. Love somebody. We tell people all the time, join a bowling league, but join it. As a missionary. I'll tell people. Sometimes I say, it's so hard to work at my job because I'm the only Christian. And it's like, I want to hug them and praise Jesus because Jesus has already infiltrated a place where there's no Christians, but you're there. Start praying, start pleading with the Lord. Start building friendships. We're supposed to Go.
I was reminded as I was studying this, where Jesus says in Matthew, as he's telling the parable of the sower, he says, as for what was sown among thorns. So he tells a story. Somebody's casting out seed, and some of it lands in a place where crows come and eat it. And he says, that's the enemy. He just steals it away. They didn't understand. He tells about some lands in an area where it's got thin soil and it just burns up as soon as the sun comes out. He tells there's a place where it begins to grow, but thorns grow out. And he says, there's a place where there's good soil and it grows and produces. When he's talking about the thorns, he says this. He says, this is what that picture was. As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word. But the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word and it proves unfruitful.
> As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.
And I just wonder how much of when we talk about what it looks like to obey Jesus, what it looks like to share the gospel, do the things that we say are in the way, fit in the category of the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches. And if we heard the Word, but it's being choked, there's hope in Christ. There's a day of judgment. And those who don't know Jesus and have not had him rescue them will spend eternity away from them. And on that day, there's a lot of things you're not going to care about on that day. There's a lot of things I'm not going to care about that I've spent time, energy and effort on. And I read this and I say, lord, stay patient. Because there's more people who need repentance and we need to go. Let's pray. Where we ask that your spirit would empower us, that you would burden us with the glorious weight of the good news, that we would carry this message, that we would risk awkwardness, that we would risk difficulty, that we would focus on, that we would see clearly that day so that we might be comforted, so that we might endure, that we might run from sin. And so, Lord, that we might proclaim that you were going to judge the living and the dead, but that you are the living God who died so that there might be forgiveness. May we go to hell in Jesus name. Amen.
The band's gonna come back up. We're gonna sing. But I would ask you at this moment to consider what needs to change? How do you need to organize your life if this is true? What does that mean? Who do you need to tell? Who do you need to tell today? Who do you need to call and say, hey, can we get together? Where do you need to be more intentional with the way that you organize your time so that we might go? This news is too good and that day is too real for us to stay quiet.
Re:Member Core Doctrines III: Salvation
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. We are working our way through our membership commitment. In some ways, it's like if you went and saw a band and they only played their hits, they didn't replace the drummer and he got to write a song about his child and you have to listen to that. None of that, just only hits. That's kind of what we're doing with our membership commitment. It's like these are the straightforward, clear doctrines of the faith and how we're gonna practice them together as a church family. And we're just walking through that together, trying to see where this comes from in the Scriptures, how it applies to us, how we're gonna walk that out here and so glad that you're here this morning and we're getting to do this together. Today we are looking at the doctrine of salvation. So this is commitments five and six, and we are looking at what Christ has done for us in salvation. And I feel a little bit this morning that you get to talking to a grandmother and y'all remember that it doesn't happen like it used to, but they would pull out of their purse this little thing of their grandchildren, and each one of them precious and wonderful and worthy of explanation of who's playing the clarinet and who's pre law and who's just so wonderful and precious. They'd get that gleam in their eye and you're, I'm going to be here a while. Now they can do it on their phone. And it's infinite. I feel that this morning as we look into salvation and we look into this statement that's just each section just packed with beauty and wonder and glory. And so we're going to take this time this morning to study the Scriptures on who Jesus is and what he has done for us in the work of salvation, this act of God on our behalf. My hope is that we would delight in that and respond to that in worship and faith. So take a moment with me as we pray.
As we begin. Lord, we are seeking to, through faith in the work of your spirit, to peer into things that are too wonderful for us. We ask that you would help us to delight in the wonder of salvation and the hope of your glory, and that you would help us to perceive it in our hearts how good and glorious you are and what you have accomplished for us in Christ in Jesus name, Amen.
So commitment number five says Jesus is The Son of God who died in my place for my sin, securing for me God's grace and relationship with him forever. I have been saved by God's grace through faith in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. My salvation is not a result of any of my actions, good works or morals. There's a whole lot in there. We're going to walk through it. Commitment 6. I have been sealed by the Holy Spirit for salvation and empowered by him for mission and service. We're only going to look at the first half of that this morning. So we'll just look at I have been sealed by the Holy Spirit for salvation. We will look at the second half next week.
Let's go to the beginning of this. Says Jesus is the Son of God who died in my place for my sin. Let's consider that first. When Gabriel comes to Joseph in Matthew chapter one, he says she will bear a son. He's declaring to him that Mary is pregnant, she's going to have a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.
> She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. (Matthew 1:21, ESV)
So that's what we looked at last week, that we have sin, that we are a part of the rebellion, that Adam and Eve rebelled against God, they fell into sin, and that we've joined that rebellion, that we've participated in that, and Jesus expressly is coming to save his people from their sins. Or as Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 15:3.
> For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, (1 Corinthians 15:3, ESV)
Let me tell you, if you have approached Christianity and you have held something up as first importance, and it is not that, then you're confused about the message of Christianity. If you've come in with, well, let me understand this, or you talk to people sometimes and they're like, you're trying to talk to them about Christianity. I got a lot of questions about Noah's Ark. And it's like, hey, can I tell you, that's not the main point of Christianity. We can get there. But this is what Christianity has come to declare, that Christ died in accordance with the Scriptures, that this was prophesied and that he's come to save his people from their sin, that he died for our sins. That sin is a cancer that is killing us, and Christ comes as the physician to heal us. That sin is a prison that we are captured in, and that Christ is the one who opens the doors, lets the sun in, picks us up and carries us out. That he's the hero, the rescuer, the hope. That's the testimony of the scriptures. First John 4 says it this way.
> In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:10, ESV)
So he displays his love for us in doing this. And he's the propitiation, which is a theologically dense term that means he absorbs wrath. That, as Paul says in Romans 1, that the wrath of God is put on display, that it's against all of the wickedness and unrighteousness of men. Or as he says in Romans 3, that we're storing up wrath for the day of wrath because of our lack of repentance, and that Christ comes as the propitiation for our sin, that he takes wrath, that he absorbs the wrath on our behalf. Tim Keller puts it in a really tangible way when he says that sin is like, if I come to your house and break a lamp. When you sin, a real thing happens. Something tangible happens in the world. He says that you can say, you owe me a lamp, or you can say, don't worry about it. But you saying don't worry about it doesn't fix the lamp. It just means you're going to pay for it. That's what Christ has done. When people say, well, why is it such a big deal? Why didn't he say don't? Why can't he just say don't worry about it? He gives us a way to say, don't worry about it, where he pays for it, where he comes and says, I'll cover the cost of your sin. I'll absorb the wrath. That's what propitiation is. And it's wonderful that when it says he died for our sins, it means that we really incurred debt that we have, debt that we owe, that we've caused, and he comes and pays for it.
Or in Galatians 2:20, it says,
> I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20, ESV)
This is one of the reasons why it's personal in the way we have written it in our commitment, that he died in my place for my sin. That's the way Paul is saying it here, that he loved me and gave Himself for me. Yes, he loved the church and gave Himself for the church. He loved us and gave Himself for us. That he died for our sins, but he also died for my sin. That he also died for your sin. That he knows you, knows the cost and the debt of your sin, loves you and died for your sin. That if you are in Christ, that that is personal. That it's not something where you get brought into a big group and you just sneak in. I was at a South Carolina game and we were sitting near the little club thing and it started pouring rain. This wasn't yesterday, but it was a couple weeks ago and it just was pouring. We just charged into the covered area and there was no way for them to check everybody. We just snuck in. There's too many people coming, too much rain. You just were like, don't worry about me, I'm coming in. Some of us act like that's how you got into Christ, that you somehow snuck past and that he loves other people dearly and that he paid for their sin and that you somehow have just kind of gone in the back and stood in the corner and he's not really noticing you. But that's not the reality. He knows you personally, loves you dearly and personally and rescues you personally and pays for your sin personally. If you belong to Jesus, you belong to him and he knows you and cares for you. That's a reality of the salvation that we have in Christ. Do not let the enemy lie to you and say that you somehow got in on a technicality and that he loves the Church, but not really you, because that is not true. If you belong to Jesus, he knows and loves you dearly and has died for you, who loved me and gave Himself for me. That's the way Paul says it.
So what happens when he does this? The next part of this is he's securing for me. He died for my sins, securing for me God's grace, relationship with him forever. We're going to consider God's grace that he brought us into it. We're going to consider that in a moment. But first we're going to look at this relationship with him forever. In our sin, we are alienated from God. This is the way Colossians 1:21–22 says it.
> And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, (Colossians 1:21–22, ESV)
Alienated means there's a gap. There's no relationship, it's broken. You don't belong to each other. The tie and the love and the relationship severed. This is where we are in our sin. That if you are standing in Adam, you are alienated from God and you're hostile to him. You're an enemy. That's the way Paul puts it in Romans 5. He says, we're enemies of God, but he says we're doing evil deeds. He says he has now reconciled, which means to bridge the gap and restore the relationship. So it's undoing alienation. He has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him. The work of the Cross reconciles us to the Father. So you'll hear people say things like, sin separates us from God. And that's true if we exist in our sin. But if we exist in Christ, then we are reconciled and we are holy and blameless and above reproach before him through what he has done in his body of flesh by his death. So that you get moved to Christ, and then your sin does not separate you from God because he has done the work of reconciliation, that he's restored the relationship.
Reading a book recently written by Lee Strobel, he was talking with someone about heaven, and they were discussing the concept of reconciliation between people in heaven, that those that we've had animosity towards, that as we are redeemed in Christ, we are brought back into relationship. Lee Strobel was talking about the fact that he was very rebellious as a teenager. His father was a believer, but that he had contributed so much to the deterioration of that relationship. His father, one time, exasperated in anger, looked at him before his senior prom and said, I don't have enough love for you to fill up my pinky finger. Lee Strobel said we never fixed that. We never reconciled. We never sorted that out. My father's past, and I believe he was a true believer. I think he's gone on to be with the Lord. He said, I've thought over and over again about how much my sin contributed to our relationship. I didn't have a chance to repent. I didn't have the chance to reconcile. They were discussing that when he enters eternity, that relationship will be restored, that there will be peace, that there'll be forgiveness, that there'll be joy, that they'll be brought back together. I was just overwhelmed by the thought of that and this, that we would be reconciled to God, that our hostility between him and us would be restored through the work of Christ, that we would belong, that when we showed up, there would be nothing between us that would make us want to hide or shrink back because of the work of Christ, that we would have all the freedom and all the joy and all the delight to run to him and not feel like that's odd. And that he would have the same relationship with us. It's beautiful that we've been reconciled and we have a relationship with him forever. We should be overwhelmed by that.
It says this. I have been saved by God's grace through faith in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, that we are in Christ, that the gospel, the life, death and resurrection of Christ apply to us, and that we get to be brought into it, that we get to be saved through it. Let's consider the concept of grace. We've been saved by God's grace. Ephesians 2 says,
> But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved, (Ephesians 2:4–5, 8 ESV)
Let's follow the logic here. We're dead in our trespasses. So what did you bring? Trespasses. That's sin. You've crossed the line. You've trespassed. There was a thing that said, no trespassing, don't go here. And then you went there. Do y'all remember that, when y'all did that? Yeah, we've done that. We've trespassed. And what does that bring? Death. You've brought two things, death and trespass. That earned you death. But God loves us and is rich in mercy for those who have trespassed. He's made us alive together with Christ. When Christ rose, we get to be made alive with him. Then it says,
> For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. (Ephesians 2:8–9, ESV)
That does not tell us what grace is. It tells us that grace is wonderful. You read that and go, well, I'm so thankful for grace. Grace sounds great. If I told you the flux capacitor lets you time travel, you're like, wow, what's a flux capacitor? That's kind of what this is. Grace saved us. The salvation sounds wonderful, but what is grace? He says in verse eight, for by grace you have been saved through faith. This is not your own doing. It is the gift of God. So grace is a gift. Another way of putting this an acronym somebody told me one time, is God's riches at Christ's expense Grace, or God's righteousness at Christ's expense, meaning that he pays for it and then we receive it. But it's a gift. I had someone a week ago say, hey, I have a gift for you. You know what I said, whoa, thanks. Sweet. Sounds good. I love that sentence. It's one of my favorite sentences. You know what? I didn't say, hey, I have a gift for you. I didn't go, okay, tell me what I gotta do. They just said, quit being weird. Open it. I don't take it from my hand when I hand it to you. Do you not know what gifts are like? That's how grace works. We don't come in and go, okay, what do I have to do? How am I going to be saved? All right, no, it's a gift. This is received. This doesn't get better than that. There's something in us that wants to earn something, that wants to achieve something. What has happened is that Christ has gone to work on our behalf, and graciously, as a gift, hands out salvation to those who believe. That's what it says, that we come in by faith. Romans calls it a free gift. It says that we've been saved through faith.
So let's consider faith. What is faith? If faith is what brings me into grace and grace is what gives me salvation, then I need to know what faith is. John 3:16 says,
> For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16, ESV)
That's that relationship forever, that eternal life that we get brought into something that's going to last forever. That we're brought in by belief, that we're trusting in Jesus. Somebody asked Jesus in John chapter six. They said, what do I need to do? In John 6, Jesus answered them,
> Jesus answered them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent." (John 6:29, ESV)
You want to do the work. You trust Jesus. You might be inclined to say, well, that doesn't sound like work. Yes, wonderful. It doesn't. It's surrender. It's anti-work. It's us putting down the tools and saying, I'm trusting in Jesus. My hope is in Him. It's not in me. Romans 4:24 says, he's talking about righteousness, which would be the right standing before God. It says,
> but for us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, (Romans 4:24, ESV)
who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. He goes to the cross for our trespasses, our sin, and then he's raised. Justification means that you stand in God's holy court made right. There is no claim that can be made against you because he's made us righteous. His righteousness is counted to us through the work of Christ, and we approach it through faith that we believe in Him.
Trying to make this tangible. I want to talk to the elementary students in the room. But also at some point, all of us were elementary students, so you should be able to track. If you're in elementary school, you do not know how to drive a car. I know this because you live in South Carolina and most of the adults in South Carolina don't know how to drive a car. If you're in elementary school, you might be confident that you know how to drive a car, that you could do this or you've seen it and it seems pretty, but you don't. So you're dependent on the adults around you to get you places. There are a few simple rules for you. Get in the car, close the door, put a seatbelt on. That's it. Now one of the rules you have is see who's driving the car. Do you know this person? That's actually your biggest rule. Do I trust this person? You don't just get to hop in any car. If your parents haven't told you this, I'm telling you now. Don't just hop in any car. Someone who pulls up, kicks the door open and says, get in here. No, I don't know you. I don't trust you. I don't believe you'll take me where I need to go. Belief when we come to Christ is saying, this is the car and this is the driver that's going to get me where I need to go. One of the things we need to understand is that you have no other way of getting there. You don't know how to get there yourself. You actually can't get yourself there. What we're doing when we place faith in Jesus is saying, my hope is in him, and if he doesn't get me there, I won't get there. If he doesn't save, I won't be saved. If he doesn't have mercy, I won't receive mercy. If he doesn't have righteousness, I won't receive righteousness. If he doesn't give me his righteousness, I won't get it. If he doesn't do the work, I won't be able to participate in this because I have no means on my own. But I am putting all of my faith, all of my trust in him and I have no ability. I'm along for the rush. Faith is going to him and saying, Jesus, it's all on you. I believe that you have done what the Bible says you've done. I believe that you grant by faith to all those who will trust in you salvation and that none of us are put to shame. That's faith.
My salvation is not a result of any of my actions, good works and morals. Faith, I said, is the opposite of a work. It's the undoing of work. It's surrendering. It's stopping. If I tell my kids to stop, they do it, but they do it by stopping, by not doing anything. That's somehow faith. Works is us surrendering our actions, good works and morals. Let me show you this. Ephesians 2 just told us we were dead in our trespasses, says in verse 8,
> For by grace you have been saved through faith. This is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. (Ephesians 2:8–9, ESV)
If you boast about a gift, you're boasting about the giver of the gift. If I see you with something nice and I say, wow, that's really nice, and you go, yeah, I'm not trying to brag, but I had a birthday. It's like, yeah, you shouldn't be trying to brag. That was terrible bragging. You didn't earn who gave it to you. You could say, but then it would be pointing to the person who gave the gift. There's no boasting for us in salvation because we didn't do anything. We haven't earned this. Romans 3:20 says,
> For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. (Romans 3:20, ESV)
This is very important. If you've come into your hope of salvation and you think it's about doing the stuff right, being good enough, following the rules, that's not how this works. We are not justified by the law. We don't have any work that we can do to show to the Lord. Romans 11:6 says,
> But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace. (Romans 11:6, ESV)
If I said, I have a gift for you if you win it, well, it's not a gift, it's a prize. It's a trophy. You can now brag about it. I have a gift for you. Give me $500. We've exchanged something. There's some kind of contract. So if salvation has 10% you in it, well, then you get 10% of the glory. And when we sing, we should sing 10% of our songs to us. Every 10th stanza should be. Also we're great, but that's not how it works. Because work undoes grace, because grace is a gift. This is how it has to work. We can't save ourselves. If he doesn't do it, it doesn't happen. We're not able to earn this, we're not able to achieve it. It's not about you. Galatians 2:16 says,
> Yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified. (Galatians 2:16, ESV)
So if you say, well, I'm a good person, that'll count. No, God gave us standards to show we won't live up to them, and then to drive us to Christ, who fulfilled the law on our behalf and grants us his righteousness. If it had anything to do with works, then you would be owed credit and he would owe you some sort of something, and it would somehow, to some degree, be about you. That's not how it works. We receive it by grace to the praise of his glorious grace, and not to the praise of anything else.
There's actually a way for you to use your good works to avoid Jesus. I'll be good enough so that he can't have a claim on me, so that he can't tell me what I'm supposed to do. He'll owe me. But that's not how it works. We come in and say, none of my actions, none of my good works, none of my morals have saved this for me. That's wonderful news because of what we see next, which is in Commitment 6. It says, I have been sealed by the Holy Spirit for salvation. If you didn't earn it, we also get to rejoice that we don't keep it. Let me show you where this is in the text. Ephesians 1:13 says,
> In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, (Ephesians 1:13, ESV)
When you entered Christ, when you placed your hope in him, you were locked up in Christ, you were sealed in your sin, and now you're sealed in Christ. You are held captive in sin, and now you're held in Christ. I want to read another place where he mentions that same letter to try to help you understand. What does that look like? Chapter 4, verse 30 says,
> And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. (Ephesians 4:30, ESV)
This sealing tells us two things. One is he's telling him not to sin, and he says, don't grieve the Holy Spirit by whom you were sealed. He doesn't say, if you sin, you'll lose the Holy Spirit. He just says, don't grieve him; he's with you and he'll mourn your sin. He doesn't like it, so don't walk in sin. You grieve the Spirit, but he doesn't say he'll leave you. You don't work your way into salvation, which means you can't sin your way out of it. We are called to continue to follow him in faith. We are called to obey. We're going to be there the whole time. But the Spirit's at work in us and we cannot fall out. We've been sealed for the day of redemption. This is why Hebrews calls Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith. This is why in Philippians it says he who began a good work in you will carry it to completion on the day of Jesus Christ. Christ is going to get you there because it's to the praise of his glorious work and grace on our behalf that he's rich in mercy, as Peter says it, that we're being guarded by God's power. You're not guarded by your power. You're not guarded by your strength. You're not guarded by your focus, love, energy. So often I get to go to the Lord and say, I'm so weak, I'm so distracted. I'm so small and I'm guarded by Him, I'm carried by Him. I'm like a toddler in a car seat in the back of the car. At no point did it suddenly become my responsibility. That's the salvation that we get to have in Christ. We don't have it in anyone or anything else. It's held for us in Christ. Accomplished by Christ, kept by Christ to the glory of Christ.
Let's pray and then I'll tell us how we're going to respond. Father, we are thankful for this salvation. We're thankful for you loving us, for you being rich in mercy, for you bringing us from death to life, for you keeping us, for you qualifying us for you, holding us, for you welcoming us. Lord, may our hearts be able to taste that so that we might rejoice in some measure fitting to the glorious nature of this salvation. Lord, for anyone in this room who still stands in their sin, who still walks alienated and hostile, for anyone in this room who is trying to stand in their own morality, who is trying to, by works of the law, justify themselves. Oh Lord, may your spirit break in. May they hear the word of the gospel and may they believe. May you seal them for the day of redemption to the praise of your glorious grace in Jesus name, Amen.
As a church, we study the Scriptures, we read the Word, and we respond. It's the way that God works on our behalf and then we respond to him. The way we're going to respond this morning is we're going to take communion as a church family. For those of you who are Christians and have placed faith in Christ, this is where we remember that on the night Jesus was betrayed, he took bread and he said, this is my body broken for you. And he took the cup and he said, this is the blood of my covenant poured out for you as a forgiveness of sins. When we take communion, we proclaim his death until he returns. We tangibly, physically remind ourselves that Christ did this for me and I am in him. I'll dip the bread, I'll hold it, juice will run on my fingers and I'll remember that Christ really tangibly actually came and died for me and that I get to partake, that he's in me, that he keeps me, that my hope is in Him. So take this morning and remind yourself that I was dead in my trespasses and sins. But he has grace. He's rich in mercy. My hope is in Him. Tell him once again, Lord, I need you. I need you to redeem me. I need you to keep me. I need you to save me. If you don't do it, it won't happen. But praise Christ that you came and that you died and that you redeemed.
If you're in this room and you have not trusted in Jesus, in a moment when we begin to move around, I want you to get up, place your faith in Jesus. I want you to walk down and get on your knees and ask the Lord to save you. I want you to tangibly lock in that I am going to Christ and I am surrendering to Christ, that it is about him and him alone, that my hope is in him and him alone. If you're in elementary school, grab your parent's hand, walk with them. They'll come pray with you. If you have clarifying questions or you need help, I'll stand down here and talk with you as well. But I want you to move and go. Lord, I need the hope of salvation. I need the work of Christ. I don't want to trust myself. I want to surrender. Don't fight with the Spirit. If he's calling you, come because salvation is a gift to be received. Come and ask the Lord to heal you and to save you and to bring you life.
Daniel's gonna come up, we're gonna play. We're gonna take communion as a church family. If you haven't trusted in Jesus, I invite you to come and to trust in Him. When you're ready, take communion.
Re:Member Core Doctrines II: Fall and Rebellion
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. My headset mic broke this morning, so I get to hold this. The only benefit I know of holding a mic is that at the end of my sermon, I get to drop it dramatically, if you will, grab a Bible and go to Genesis, chapter one. We are, as a church, working through our membership commitment, and we are walking through. Our membership commitment is one sheet of paper. And it's just bullet points. The first eight or so are theological points that we agree to, and then the second half really is how we're going to practice that here. Our hope for this series is that this is edifying, encouraging, helpful, and that we collectively as church can recommit to these things, if you like. I hadn't committed to this stuff. We're walking through what they mean, where they come from in the scriptures. We wrote these down, but we did not make them up. And so what we're doing is reading them and then showing where this comes from in the Bible, where this idea comes from, where it's anchored in. And so that's what we're doing. Last week we looked at the first two. The first one says that the Bible is inerrant and it is the authority over my life. So we're committing to, we believe the Bible. We're going to study the Bible. That's actually primarily what we do on Sundays is just teach through books of the Bible. And so we're going to study it, we're going to apply it to our lives. The second one is that God has existed forever as a trinitarian God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And today we are looking at numbers three and four. So I'm going to read them, then we're going to pray and we're going to get started. So number three is this. Humanity was created to live in perfect relationship with God, joining in the fellowship of the Trinity. However, the first humans rebelled against God and chose to live outside of God's perfect rule. And then number four, number three is really theological in nature. And then number four is taking that and helping see where we show up. It says, as a continuing part of that rebellion, I am in my natural state, sinful and separated from God because of my sin. I have earned God's wrath towards me and an eternity in hell. That is what we're going to walk through this morning. We're really going to take it sentence by sentence. It'll be basically walk through in four parts. If you are new to Christianity, new to the church, this is a Good morning for you. Because we're going to explain a whole lot of why. Why do we exist? What's God's intent for humanity? Why does God respond to us the way that he does? Why is Jesus coming such good news that we would gather consistently to sing about it. That's what we're going to look at this morning. So I'm going to pray and then we got our work cut out for us. Because whenever I have to face off against stuff like this, the whole Bible's at my disposal. And it says this stuff over and over and over and over again. And so I'm always in the tension of like, how much Bible are we going to read? All of it or just some of it? And we're, we're going to read a lot of it this morning as we kind of go through all of these. So let's pray and let's get started.
Lord, we ask for your help. We ask for the work of your spirit in our hearts so that this wouldn't just be something that we think about, but it would be something that we believe. It wouldn't just be something that we consider this morning, but it would go from our head to our heart so that we might see and reckon with the glorious nature of you, of our creation and of our salvation. Help us to see and feel our sin this morning so that we might respond to you in repentance and love. In Jesus name, Amen.
So the first one, we're going to take that first part. Humanity was created to live in perfect relationship with God, joining in the fellowship of the Trinity. I told you to turn to Genesis. We are going Genesis 1:1-2.
> In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
So the Bible opens up with God preexisting and in the act of creation. Then it's going to say that he begins to speak creation into existence. And this is where John the Apostle is going to pick up. He's going to say in the beginning when he starts his gospel and he's going to highlight something for us. He's going to say this in John chapter one.
> In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
He was in the beginning with God. The Word is personal.
> All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.
> And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
So at the beginning of the Scriptures, we are met with the Trinity working in creation. And then it says this, Genesis 1:26. After he's created everything, he goes and he creates humanity.
> Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."
So far we see the Trinity at work, and we see that humanity was created. But in Genesis, if you were to ask, why was humanity created? The best answer you'll get is to have dominion over the earth. And that's true. But God's intent, His purpose for humanity is actually bigger than that and more beautiful than that. But we don't get to see it until we see how he responds to the Fall, until He responds to the rebellion and the sin of humanity. So I want to show you, I'm going to try to help you see that we were intended to be invited into this relationship with God. So once sin enters the world and God begins to respond to humanity's sin, and my page turning is going to be more awkward because I only have one hand. We see in Exodus, chapter 29 as God's bringing the people out of slavery, it says this.
> I will dwell among the people of Israel and will be their God. And they shall know that I am the LORD their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them. I am the LORD their God.
Original intent in the garden was that these people would belong to him and that he would dwell with them. There's this relational nature to God's design. And I want you to know that God did not create humanity because he lacked some sort of relation. He wasn't lonely because he existed forever in a trinitarian nature. We get invited into the love and the joy, the relationship that already existed. He created humanity out of an excess of love and relationship, not out of a need for it. But then he says his intent as he's bringing them out is, I'm going to live with you. You're going to be my people. In Exodus 34, when he displays himself to Moses, he says this.
> The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, "The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness."
When he says what he's like, he speaks of it in these relational terms. He's merciful, he's gracious, he's abounding in steadfast love. He could say mighty, terrifying, awe inspiring. But when he starts talking, he says, no, he talks about his goodness and his relational nature. Deuteronomy 6, before they're sent into the promised land, they're commanded:
> You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.
God's intent for humanity is that he would dwell with them, share his love with them, and that they, us, we might love him, that our response to him is love. That's wonderful. It fits in the same category where, I'll look at my boys sometime and I go, no, you're not gonna talk to your mama like that. You're gonna love your mama. That's your mama. You're gonna treat her. She exists in this. The nature of your relationship is one where you're gonna love her, you're gonna care for her, and for me to demand that is good for them. And when God says, I love you and you need to love me, this is how this is meant to work. That's wonderful news, because it could exist in all these other ways, but the nature of God's purpose in creation was that we would belong to him, they would love them. And he keeps going. This is Jeremiah 31, the prophet, speaking. He says,
> At that time, declares the LORD, I will be the God of all the clans of Israel, and they shall be my people.
He brings them back. He says, they're going to belong to me. And he says,
> I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.
The prophet Hosea, God specifically tells him to marry a prostitute because she's going to keep leaving him. He says, you're going to keep chasing her. And in that way you're going to picture what it's been like between me and Israel. And he says this:
> And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy, and I will betroth you to me in faithfulness.
What was God's purpose in creation? That he might marry his people, that they might have this type of a love relationship that should blow our minds. That God's desire, the Creator of the universe, his desire for humanity, is that they would belong to him, and that there would be this depth of relationship and love. This is what we were built for. When you think, what's my purpose? Why did God create us? Or why does humans exist? Is this all random? No, God created humanity. He created you that you might love him, that you might know him, and that he might love you. And that that might be wonderful. I feel like you all are less enthused than you should be, but okay. This is why Jesus, when he shows up, he uses bride and groom language. This is why John the Baptist says, I'm not the groom. I'm just the friend of the groom. But the groom's coming. This is why the book of Revelation takes us to the wedding supper of the Lamb. And then in Revelation 21 it says,
> Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.
As it's picturing this redeemed relationship and this reconnection, his intent is that we would belong to him, that we would relate to him, that we would be invited into this love, that it would be shared and cherished. And he will wipe away every tear from their eyes. And death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. That was God's original intent with humanity, was this depth of relationship. Unfortunately, there's a big however that begins the next sentence. We didn't stay in this relationship long. So the next part of this theological statement that we agree to as a church is, however, the first humans rebelled against God and chose to live outside of God's perfect rule. They rebelled against God and chose to live outside of God's perfect rule.
So Genesis 2:15, 17 says,
> The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat. For in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die."
He places them in a wonderful place there's no sin, no brokenness, nothing. And he says, one rule. You can have everything. Everything's yours except for this. Do you all know anything about humans? It doesn't go well for us. Pretty quickly, they were like, what's with that one rule? And Satan comes along. If you read the story, the serpent comes and he tempts Eve. He shows up, begins to lie about God. He says, did he really say, you can't have any of the fruit? And she says, no, we just can't have that one. And he says, this is going to be good for you. He starts working in that God's not trustworthy. So Eve eats, her husband eats. He's with her. And immediately sin and death and rebellion enter the world. And there's more going on than just mere disobedience. It's not just that God had a rule and they broke the rule. There's some fundamental things that happen in this moment. I want to read this quote from a friend of mine named Brandon Clements who wrote a book called For Our Good Always. He's a pastor at Midtown Fellowship in Lexington. It says this. It was an intentional choice because not eating from that tree meant that they were accepting that God was wiser than them, that he got to determine what was good and evil, right and wrong. That he was God and they were not. Eating of the tree meant no, I get to determine what is good and evil. This is why it's rebellion. This is why it's a revolt against God's good rule, that it's humanity saying, no, we want to be in charge of that. We don't want to submit to you. We don't want to follow instructions. We don't want to trust you. We don't want to believe that you're good or for our good. We'll take it from here. Thank you.
So sin enters the world. And it's interesting what happens if you look at Genesis 3, starting in verse 8, after they had done this. It says,
> And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.
Which is just a hint of how God intended it to be. He was just going to show up, walk around the garden. His presence was going to be with them. It was going to be delightful. But the LORD God called to the man and said, Where are you? And he said, I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself. They were naked. When God created humanity, it says that they were both naked and they were unashamed. Then when sin enters the world, they notice that they're naked and they hide. And I believe that this has entered into the heart of humanity. We still dream about it. You still have that dream where you all of a sudden realize you are completely and utterly exposed. That was ripped away from us. This ability to have this sort of freedom and lack of self consciousness. Do you know how unselfconscious you have to be to be naked and not notice? It's one thing to forget your belt. It's another to forget all of that entirely and to not even notice and not even care. And the amount of freedom and the amount of peace that there is for that to exist in that way, and it's gone. Because sin brings guilt and shame and separation from the man to the woman and from us and God. So that from then on we want to hide from God. That's what enters the world. This is then the curse happens. The curse falls upon the people and God curses existence from this out of their rebellion. And this is known as the fall, which is where we existed in this state with the Lord that we have now fallen from. And then they are removed from the garden and death enters the world. And now they will die. And we've missed the garden ever since.
You know how you can get used to stuff? Stuff can just become normal. You don't even think about it. This is one of the ways I feel like that the world tells me that this story is true. One of my personal. Where it resonates with me, where I can feel this is because we're able to get used to so much. I remember when my wife and I, we had been married a couple years and we went to my family's like Christmas or Thanksgiving. It was something. We were eating a nice meal together. I don't remember exactly what it was. We went in the house and my mom has like a hutch, but it's like a glass case with stuff in it that you can look at, but you're not supposed to open the case, because inside the glass case is more glass. What protects glass better than glass? So we have one of those. We're there and my dad says, hey, come here, I want to show you something. And he opens the hutch, and inside of it he goes, check this out. And there is a dead hummingbird in there. He's like, isn't that cool? It's not like a stuffed dead hummingbird. Just one he found outside, he brought inside, stuck in the hutch. He says, usually they're beating their wings so fast, you don't ever get to see them. Look at how pretty their wings are. Also, look at how cool his tongue is, because its tongue was hanging out of its mouth. And I said, that's cool. We closed the hutch, we ate our meal. We get in the car, we're two minutes away, and my wife goes, what on earth was that? And I said, what? I had no clue what she was talking about. She said, the bird. I said, what bird? Because it had happened before the meal. And then I was like, oh. She said, the dead hummingbird that we ate next to that was in the display case. That bird. That's the bird. And I was like, oh. And then it dawned on me that that might be weird, but in my house, it's not weird. You find anything cool and dead or bonish, and you just bring it in and you go, look at this. You don't usually get to see what's on the inside of a turtle. Well, now you can. And then we just stick it somewhere in our house. Sometimes you stick it in an ant hill first, and then they get the stuff off of it. Then you bring it in your house. We're not psychos. That bird was in that hutch for several years. My older brother at one point said, it's cool. I cut the tongue out of it so it doesn't look as bad anymore. We're capable. There's so much stuff that you get used to as normal. You just get used to it. This is normal. This is how this works. This is normal food. This is normal dress. This is normal talk. This is what you know a house smells like. This is normal. And you only notice it when it's somebody else's stuff. Then you can see it. But you can get used to everything. But there's something in us that has not once ever gotten used to how broken sin is and how death works. You can bury someone who is 97, and something in you rages that, this should never happen. I should never have to say goodbye to people. This should never happen. And we can tell ourselves, yeah, but it was as good as it could be. And it's like, it's not. Because something in me tells me this is wrong. And there's a reality to eternity and the garden are in us because we were made for them. And we can still feel that we've lost them. This is in us, that something has been lost. And so we say, as we look at this, we say, we see it. We see that God made us for something beautiful. We see that we lost it. We feel it. Humanity was created to live in perfect relationship with God, joining in the fellowship trinity. However, the first humans rebelled against God and chose to live outside of God's perfect rule. And we've been living outside of that rule ever since.
So number four, it gets personal. As a continuing part of that rebellion, I am in my natural state, sinful and separated from God. I have earned God's wrath towards me an eternity in hell. Let's look at the first part of that sentence. As a continuing part of that rebellion, I am in my natural state, sinful and separated from God. That we have participated, we have joined Adam and Eve. This is known as original sin, that we're born with this. Romans 5 says,
> Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.
There's not one of us that has not joined the rebellion. There's not one of us that has not sinned. And you say, well, what is sin? Well, certainly it is disobeying. Certainly it's that God says, this is how the world should work. This is what is good, this is what is right. And we don't do that. So you have things like the Ten Commandments. We're going to set aside the first few because those first few deal with how we relate to God. But let's just look at the ones that tell us how we relate to each other. We'll come back to the first few in a second. Don't steal, don't kill. Jesus shows up and says that anger is the same thing going on in our heart, that when we hate somebody in our heart, we're doing the same thing. Don't commit adultery. Jesus shows up and suggests, lust is the same thing happening in our heart, that it's going on inside of us whether we're acting on it or not. Don't covet, don't want something that someone else has. We can't even walk around without participating in these. And we would all agree the world would be better if those things didn't happen. We're not looking at them going, those are ridiculous. It's like, no, those would be good. It'd be great if I could live in a place like if I told you there's a city you can move to and nobody ever breaks the church Ten commands. You're like, sign me up. That'd be great. You know much money we lose to the fact that people steal constantly. How big of a drain on society that is? How much of your life is spent trying to protect yourself from someone harming you or stealing from you? How much of your thought process goes to that, how much of your energy goes to that, how much anxiety goes to that? We would love for that. But we participate in them. I've stolen things. I don't want people to steal from me, but I've taken stuff from other people. We've done this. We bear false witness. We've whispered about people behind their back. We've said, you know why they do that? You don't even know why they do that. You just got an angry guess. You want to hear my blatant angry guess about this person? You don't say that. You say, I know why they did that. I know why they said that. Would you like for me to share some false witness with you? But it's deeper than that. It's not just that we disobey, but the first ones are that we would love God, that we would have no other gods before him, that it would be him and him alone. And the second one is that we would not make any graven images. And that's exactly what happens. That we would not have any sort of idolatry. That's exactly what happens in the garden, where it's not just that they disobey him, it's that they want something else more than they want Him. And we do that. How often are we going, God, I really don't want you. I just want your stuff. I just want the good parts of life. I don't really care. A whole lot of people who are saying, I'm a Christian is really just, if he's the person who give me the good stuff, then I'll follow him. But I just want the stuff. I'm in it as long as my kids behave. I'm in it as long as my health is here. And if he won't give me those things, then I'll go find something else, because I really just want him to give me the stuff. He's a means to an end. This is what Romans 1 says, that we can see God in creation, but we don't want Him. We swap him out for anything else. We don't give him glory, which is a fundamental fracture of the existence of the world. We're turning it upside down that God is essentially wonderful. And we're going to say I want some other stuff, which is a rebellion against all of creation. It's a rebellion against your very nature. So we do that. The other thing that happens is we exalt self. Boy, you love you some. We do. It's like I can't see past myself sometimes. Even when you're depressed, you still want good things to happen to you. You're like, I'm the worst. Hope I get a raise. We can't. We're self centered. One of the best ways to see this is to take a group photo. Whose face you looking at in that picture? You're not like, oh, look at all my friends. You're going, where am I at? I've taken pictures with my wife and then been like, that's a good picture. And she's been like, my eyes are closed. It's like, I didn't even look at you. Her hair's in her face. It's going through her mouth like this. I'm like, this looks good. Are you on Instagram? Pop that thing on there, just looking at myself. And then we have self righteousness. So not only the self centeredness, the self focus, but then we turn it into, well, I'll be good enough and I'll earn enough, and then God will owe me because how great I am. So even in our righteous acts and our morality, and we'll talk more about that next week, we turn it inward. And then we want sovereignty. We want to be the people who decide what's right and wrong. That's what Adam and Eve were doing. And how much do we do that? How many times have you read the Bible? How many times have you been with your group and even where we're trying and you're going, I don't know, it just doesn't seem right to me. I don't know about that. I just don't feel like God would say that. It's like we just read it and we just react. There's something in me that wants to pick. How many people will go, well, if there's a God like that, then I don't believe in him. And all they're saying is, if I was in the garden, I'd eat that apple because I'm the one who's gonna pick what's good and what's evil, what's right and what's wrong. I'm in charge of that. I can feel it. I can just sense it. You all know how much we do that. I'm just gonna follow my gut on this one. Don't. You're bad at stuff. I'm a grown man, but within the past couple years, I got pink eye. I shouldn't be trusting me with, like, good and evil. We should understand that there's something wrong with us in this rebellion and that we've joined. So that's what we look, we say, okay, we see the rebellion that they committed, and we see that we've joined. Joined. We see that this is deep in us. I want to show you Romans 3, because Romans 3 is not. It's getting after it. Paul says, what then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks are under sin.
> As it is written: "None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one." "Their throat is an open grave; they use their tongues to deceive." "The venom of asps is under their lips." "Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness." "Their feet are swift to shed blood; in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have not known." "There is no fear of God before their eyes."
If you zoom out, if you're looking down from heaven, if you're in a place where there is no sin and you're looking at the earth, this is a really good description of it. Now we know that whatever the law says, so he's quoting the law, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by the works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes the knowledge of sin. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
So we look at this and we say, okay, I see it. I see myself in this. Ephesians 2 says that we're dead and children of wrath that we're following Satan. Romans 5, 11 and Philippians 3 say that we're enemies of God. Romans 8 and Colossians 1 say that we're hostile to God. Romans 1 says we hate God. This is what we're like on our own. We don't want his rule, we don't want his instruction. We don't want him. We just want stuff to be good for us, whatever that looks like. Nobody had to teach you how to sin. Nobody has to teach little kids how to sin. I got two little kids. Nobody was coaching them up on sin at my house. I mean, we sinned in front of them every once in a while, but we weren't trying to get them to follow our, you know, we weren't sitting them aside and be like, hey, you hadn't discovered lying yet. Let me explain that to you. They're just doing it. It's crazy. You're talking to a three year old covered in powdered sugar and they're like, I don't know about donuts. What are you talking about? Donut. I don't even know if I've ever heard that word. And it's like, you little. What is this? And then we grow up, we learn these things are bad. They've happened to us. We don't like them. We know they decay society. We know that God tells us not to, and we still do it. There are things that you're actively fighting against that you don't want. You know, they're destructive for you. And you're going, there's something wrong with me. Yeah, there is.
So then it says, this second sentence in number four for us is, because of my sin, I have earned God's wrath towards me an eternity in hell. So I'm going to show you places in the Bible that articulate wrath and hell so that we can see it, because it's God's response to sin. He has two responses to sin. One is, he chases people to redeem them. And two, he has wrath and judgment. Romans 2 says, we know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. He just listed off sins, and he says, we know that God's judgment rightly falls on them. And the reality is we actually do believe it's right. You want them to catch the bad guy. You want there to be some sort of justice. You don't want evil people to get away with it. If you've watched a movie where the bad guy wins, you don't like that, that bothers you. You don't want to watch a movie where the guy you hated the whole time walks off and gets free at the end. You want the good guy to catch him. That we want justice. It's just when it turns on us that we start going, well, hold on a second. It says,
> Do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath, when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.
So he says, God's gracious to us, that we would turn away from these things, that we would repent. He says, but your heart doesn't repent, and you're storing up wrath for the day of wrath. When his judgment is revealed, there's a temptation for us to go, well, I thought God being wrathful was like an Old Testament thing, but in the New Testament, that doesn't happen. The New Testament articulates that there's a way out of it very clearly, that there's hope in the midst of it, but God's wrath is still coming on sin and sinners. Jesus talks more about hell than anybody else. And you know why he talks about hell more than anybody else? Because it's real and he loves you. When I'm with my boys and we're around something dangerous, I talk about it a lot. Back up. Get away from that. Don't touch it. It will electrocute you. Stop. I will tell them even aggressively at times. Back up. Get away from that. Jesus is doing that. This is what he says in Mark 9.
> If your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.
That hell in Jesus' description is internal and external eternal torment. There's a worm, it's an internal discomfort. There's fire. That's external comfort. And the worm never dies and the fire never stops. And if that's real, and if Jesus knows it's real so much that he would come to die to save us, isn't it beautiful that he tells us over and over again, you don't want to go there. You don't want that to happen. He talks about it a lot. He says it's a place where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth. He calls it outer darkness. He calls it destruction. Second Thessalonians chapter 1 Paul says,
> When the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.
We believe that there are certain things that are wicked and evil to do and that if you don't believe in hell, if you're going, I don't know about that. That seems awful. And we're talking about things we might look at someone and go, if they choose to pursue this type of life, that will lead them towards something awful that'll ruin their life. If they begin to do drugs like that, that'll mess their life up. They should not do that. That will be bad for them where Christians we believe in eternity, so we believe that when we choose a trajectory of rebellion, we just think the stakes are higher than just your life here will be bad. We also believe that sin unrepentance and lack of worship are a complete rejection of God and the fabric of all existence and therefore have eternal consequences. To reject God has massive consequences that go on for eternity. If we don't see our sin, then the fact that Jesus comes to live a perfect life where it says that all have sinned and therefore all have died. Jesus didn't sin, so he didn't deserve death. It was unearned when he died, and therefore he was the only one who had the credit to pay others. If you died on the cross, you'd be paying for your sin. But because Jesus didn't have sin, he's able to pay for ours. We look and say there's this rebellion and there's this people that are running headlong away from God and they're choosing willfully to do it, gleefully, spitefully, continually running from him and that he loves us so much and designed us to exist with him that he pursues to the point of dying. And then he rises so that we might know that his death was effective for sinners. And then there's a proclamation of forgiveness in his name. But the people who line up for forgiveness are the people who know they have debt. If we do not see this rebellion and our place in it, then we will not love Jesus. We will not be overwhelmed by the goodness of the gospel. If we do not see the depravity and the brokenness of our own souls and our inability to save ourselves without somehow exalting ourselves, that that would be the only route we could take would be some sort of moralistic self exaltation to the point that we are still fundamentally rejecting Christ because we just want more of ourselves. If we can't see that we're in a trap of sin that we cannot get ourselves out of because we're already guilty and we deserve death, and that the only way to try to fix it would be to declare our own righteousness which flies in the face of his goodness, and that we need Jesus, then we won't run to Him. But if we understand our sin, oh, the cross is beautiful. And we can feel the love of Jesus when He says he loves us, that he died for us, when John 3:16 says,
> For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
You see that he's not just doing something nice for you, but he's doing what he intended to do all along, which is to have us live with him and know him and love him, that we're invited in. There's going to be tears in our eyes on that day that he's going to wipe away, but he's going to be feeling the same sort of thing as he rejoices in the redemption of his people, because he longs for it too, that that joy will be shared because that's what he's wanted. I have the opportunity today to a young couple in our church is getting married and I get to be the officiant. One of the passages I love to talk about when I do that is Ephesians 5.
> Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.
We look at our rebellion and we look at our sin. And then we see Jesus sprinting after the church and giving himself up so that he might have her. It says he washes us and there's no spot or wrinkle or blemish or any such thing. That's the type of love that we're invited into. But in order for us to see it and to love it and to rejoice in it, we have to know the type of sin that we have. Let's pray.
Father, I pray that our experience with sin, with the knowledge of our rebellion, would not be mental, but that you would help us to feel it and to know it, to see the darkness of our own hearts, so that the offer of forgiveness carried out in the cross by Christ would be good news and so that we might trust you. In Jesus name, amen.
The band's going to come back up. I would invite you if you have never really considered your sin. I would invite you to begin to try to understand the nature of your brokenness and the offer to believe in Jesus. To just say, I trust you. I don't trust me to do this. I trust you to reverse in some ways what happened in the garden where we said, I'll be in charge of this. To come and say, I can't be in charge of this. You have to do it. I need you to save me. To go to the cross and say, I don't want my sin. I want you and I need your rescue and I need your redemption. I need your hope. I need you to be the one who does this. And if we believe in our heart and confess with our mouth, we will be saved. And there are none that call on him that would be brought to shame. Nobody trusts in Jesus and is put to shame.
Re:Member Core Doctrines I: Word of God, Trinity
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Spencer. I am one of the pastors here. We started a new series last week. We finished up First Samuel. We'll get back to Second Samuel in the new year. We started a series called Remember where We Are Remembering. We are walking through what it looks like to be a member here as we walk through our membership commitment. So we're taking the next few months to walk through this commitment. Normally, as we study through books of the Bible, we get to look at the text and follow along with what God is doing in his redemptive story in this world. But this is something where we get to walk through 14 membership commitments that we have written that our membership abides by and see where these actually come from, the scriptures, to see why we believe these things and why it is good to be bound by these beliefs together as a church, as we seek to be a gospel centered community on mission. So this commitment actually a lot of ways, when you read it, actually functions a lot like a discipleship game plan. And that's one of the things that we'll see over the next couple of months that this is if you want to figure out who we're called to be and how we're called to make disciples. These 14 statements kind of provide an outline for that. So if you're new and you've been coming around for a bit, this is actually a very good time to walk with us as we walk through this membership commitment to see the things that bind us together in belief and practice. But if you've been here for a few years, my hope is that this would be an encouragement, that this would be a shot in the arm. This would be galvanizing. This would help us remember why we commit to be members of this church and what we hope to do. So what we're going to do is look at two statements this morning. The first two statements that are foundational for really the rest of the statements that flow out of them. So we're going to see these first two foundational statements. But let me tell you first about how 98 people lost their lives a few years ago. So a few years ago in Florida, there was a condo building that collapsed. I mean, it just looked like a demolition. It just completely collapsed. And 98 people instantly lost their lives. And I remember watching the video from that. I remember me kind of echoing the same sentiments that so many people have, which is, how in the world does that happen in America in 2021? Like, how is it possible for an entire building to just collapse? And everyone was like, I mean, you've seen throughout history, this has happened with different buildings, but with all the building codes, all the things we have here, how does a building just fall? And as they started to do the studies on it, it became very clear that what happened with this building is what happens with a lot of buildings over time. But the foundation of this building was not sound. It seemed they had cut corners. It seemed they had neglected things, and the foundation was crumbling, and it was unable to support the weight of everything above it. And when they did this, when they neglected the foundation of this building, catastrophe ensued. It was a disaster. It was awful. And I can think of no better metaphor than to think about what happens if you build your life upon the wrong foundation. That as you think about faith, what it means to build your life on the wrong beliefs. Because if you do not have a solid foundation to build your faith upon, it will crumble under the weight of everything above will not last. It will break and it will fall. And these first two commitments are unbelievably important to us. They're important for us. They are the foundation upon which we build the rest of our faith. So we're going to walk through these two commitments. We're going to see how important they are, because they are how we view the Bible and how we view our God. So let me pray, and then we'll walk through this together.
Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us either discover or for some of us, rediscover what it means to be a people that build our lives upon you. And may that be so compelling to our hearts that we not just be hearers of the Word, but we would be doers of the Word in responding in faith and in repentance and reorienting our lives in a way that honor you. In Jesus name, Amen.
All right, so we're gonna get this first. Commitment number one. The Bible is God's inerrant revelation of Himself to us. And I accept it as the authority over my life. Life. That's the Bible. The first 60 or the 66 books in the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation. If there's a blue Bible around you, that's it. That that Bible is God's inerrant, meaning it is truthful, it is trustworthy, the inerrant revelation of Himself to us that God reveals Himself to us in His Word. It's how we know God. And I accept it as the authority over my life, meaning I submit myself to this God through His Word and trusting him and believing him and being obedient. To his will. That's what this commitment says. And some will ask, wait a second, why are you starting with the Bible? Why don't you start with God? Why would you elevate the Bible above God? That seems out of order. And I could understand how it may seem that way. When you read a lot of systematic theologies, which are just theology textbooks that have organized our beliefs in a way that's systematic. That's why it's called systematic theology, you guys. In case you didn't know, they start with the Word. And the reason why is because before we get to who God is, we have to start with a baseline. How do we actually know who this God is to begin with? How can we actually know Him? What is our source? Now, there are two sources for how God reveals Himself to us. The first is what's called general revelation. This is creation revealing who our God is. That when you look at the Milky Way, that when you look at the Grand Canyon, when you feel that there's something bigger than yourself and you feel small and you start to see someone had to have made this. That is how God reveals Himself generally. Romans chapter one captures this in verses 19 and 20.
> because what may be known of God is plain to them, for God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. (Romans 1:19–20 ESV)
What we see in that is this reality that the heavens, the stars, the beautiful mountains and valleys and sea and rivers, all of it in its grandness, reveals the. The invisible attributes of God, namely His divine power, that a creator made this, that feeling that everyone feels that's built into us because God has revealed Himself through creation. When you read Psalm 19, which is a psalm that regularly shows up in our call to worship, the first half of that psalm is picturing how God reveals himself to creation, how it shows his glory. So that's one way God reveals himself. The second way is what's called special revelation. This is how God specifically specially reveals Himself to us through His Word, through the Scriptures, through from Genesis to revelation, these 66 books in the Bible. And that's how we get to know God. Specifically the Book of Hebrews, which is a New Testament letter that is capturing how Christ fulfills the old covenant. So it very helpfully ties together the Old Testament and the New Testament.
> Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, 2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. (Hebrews 1:1–2 ESV)
Then we get this picture of he talks about our fathers by the prophets. That is the Old Testament, that God spoke through the prophets. That's how we have the Old Testament, the Old Covenant. But in the new covenant of Christ, Jesus speaks. And when you play that out, what that is is the Gospels, the recordings of Jesus teachings. And then the apostles who God used to write Scripture to. We saw this last week to churches in the New Testament, to people of the New Testament. These are the apostles who carried the teachings of Christ with them and God spoke through them to us. The Old, the New Covenant together, the Old and New Testament. This is God's word to us that reveal more of who God is in a way that creation cannot, in a way that is powerful. In 2 Timothy 3, 16, 17, it says all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training and righteousness. That the man of God may be complete equipped for every good work.
> All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:16–17 ESV)
That language of breathed out. That's where we get the word inspired. That God inspires through men his eternal wonderful truth. And God uses this to bring us into faith. But he uses this to teach, to reproof, to correct, to train us in righteousness that we may be equipped for every good work that God has called us to do. The Scriptures are powerful and they are true. That God has spoken truthfully. We use the phrase inerrant means devoid of any error. This is something we've taught for years in our church. We've talked over and over again about how God speaks truthfully, that our Bibles are trustworthy. And after teaching this for years, this is something that actually in our membership commitment, we've added this word inerrant. And we'll talk about this at family meeting to help clarify. This is something that we've always believed and it's something we should build our faith upon to trust God that when he has spoken, he has spoken truthfully. That certainly there are times in the Bible where it's hard to figure out what this text means versus this text. But as at the end of the day, when the dust settles, we can trust our Bibles unbelievably trustworthy. There's so many people who've dedicated their lives to helping see some of the nuances of how the Greek and the Hebrew were transcribed over time and how it's completely trustworthy. We spent some time in this in the past to help us see that our Bibles are so unbelievably trustworthy. We've looked at some stuff from like, Wesley Huff. We've done some video work on that in the past to help us see that man. There's so much that we can see that we can build our lives upon this as being true. And the Bible testifies to this. We look at Psalm 19, the second half of Psalm 19. It begins in verse 7.
> The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple; 8 the precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. (Psalm 19:7–8 ESV)
Law, testimony, precepts, commandment. These are all phrases that mean the word of God. And it is perfect and it is sure and it is right and it is pure. And you'll see this over and over again. The Scriptures are trustworthy. They're reliable. That when God speaks, we can trust him. And not just trust him, but obey him. That we would see him as the authority in our lives. The Scriptures are authoritative. The way God speaks, we respond. So much so that when he says, flee from sexual immorality, we say, yes, my flesh wants this, but I'm going to flee. I'm going to run from this. Because I know ultimately I'm going to trust you over my own desires. That when God says, keep yourself from the love of money and be content with all things, we say, I know that I live in a culture that pushes me to build my life on success, the American dream, but I'm going to run from that. I'm going to keep myself free from that. I'm going to trust you above my own instincts, God. That when God speaks, we respond. This is unbelievably important. This is foundational. Because the Bible has to be part of this foundation that helps us trust who our God is. When he says who he is and it reveals who God is, which is our second commitment that we would know this God commandment number two. The God that scripture reveals has existed forever as a trinity. God the Father, God the Son, Jesus, and God the Holy Spirit.
So the God that scripture, that's the Bible that you have reveals, just talked about, has existed forever, meaning that God is outside of time in a way that breaks our brain. That time is a linear thing that he has created and eternity past, which we don't know how that works. God forever existed. He exists in outside of time. And when time ends after time and eternity future, God forever exists, which again, we don't Know how that works. Our finite minds can't understand that, but has existed forever as a trinity. God the Father, God the Son, Jesus, and God the Holy Spirit. Now, Trinity is not a word you will find in the Bible. It's not a word that you'll see in the Scriptures in the same way that inerrant is not a word you'll find in the Bible. But over time, we've had to. We've had to come up with words and concepts to describe what's happening in the Scripture and also answer false teachings over time. And that's where the doctrine of the Trinity came. In the first few centuries, as the early church fathers were looking at the Scriptures, trying to understand who our God is, we came up with the doctrine of the Trinity, built upon the Scriptures, which just means tri unity, our triune God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, three distinct persons, completely and fully one God. Which, as we try to understand that, again, our brains do not compute. I got three kids, 10, 8, and 6. When we read the Bible together, when we talk through different theological things I'm trying to instill and teach to them, they get to the Trinity and we've had this conversation, and they'll be like, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second. Our God is one, but he's three. But three isn't one. And they just go, what? That doesn't make sense. And I say, welcome to the party. Christians for centuries have sat in the mystery of who our God is, that he is one and that he's three. And, yep, what you're feeling right now is very normal. And there have been ways to try to explain who our God is as a triune God. There's a symbol that's been used for years in church history that I find helpful, and it's been very, very, very common for many centuries. And it helps us see that the Father is God, but the Father is not the Son, and is not the Holy Spirit. And Jesus is God, but he's not the Holy Spirit. He's not the Father. The Holy Spirit is God, but he's not the Father, and he's not the Son, Distinct, but all God. And it's like, what I know. It's hard. It's hard for us to understand it. It's paradoxical. It may seem contradictory to us because we operate in finite rules, in finite order of the universe. Our God is infinite and stands outside of the finite order that he created. So we take this in faith to understand who our God is. And the Church did this. Y' all looking at the Scriptures, looking at Genesis 1:26, it says, then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness.
> Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." (Genesis 1:26 ESV)
That is God, us, our in conversation with himself, making humanity in his image. That when Jesus gives the great commission, he says, go therefore, make disciples of all nations baptized in the name of the Father, the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
> Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, (Matthew 28:19 ESV)
That when we baptize people in the name of our God, it is Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Three in one. In the New Testament, when you get to certain sections that are encouragements, you see 1 in 2nd Corinthians 13:14. It says, the grace of the Lord Jesus and the love of God, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
> The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. (2 Corinthians 13:14 ESV)
And it's this language of Father, Son, Holy Spirit, that God the Father, in his deep love for us, sends Christ the Son to be crucified for us to conquer the power of death, of the resurrection, to bestow grace upon us. That the work of the Holy Spirit renews and brings to life in our hearts and carries us through to completion until we see God face to face. This is the work of our triune God. And it's something that the Church has grappled with for a very long time. That's one thing I don't think we appreciate in the modern setting. We don't appreciate that the first few centuries of the Church was really trying to understand this, really trying to get this right, really having big debates and trying to understand our God correctly. And I think we take those battles for granted. I do. We'll try to explain God with cheap illustrations that don't, not only don't do justice, but speak wrongly about our God. I've heard this for years. This is a classic illustration. Some will say that, you know, God is like water, and at room temperature it's a liquid, but when you freeze it, it turns into a solid because it's ice. That's the second form of water. But the third form of water is when you heat it up and it turns into a vapor, it's a gas. So it's all one substance. One substance, but three different forms. And people go, oh, yes, that's a great way to understand it. And church history goes, no, no, no, that's a historical heresy called modalism. One God, three forms. That is not what I just put on the screen earlier. No, that's something the Church fought over for a very long time. To not see as one God and three substances. No, one God, three distinct persons, three and one. And it's hard to wrap our minds around this, but we should go with what the Scriptures give us. We should not try to go outside of it. We should not try to oversimplify this for human understanding. No way. And we should acknowledge those false teachings that get the Trinity wrong and realize that there's danger in that it leads to judgment. That Jehovah's Witness, Mormonism, Oneness, Pentecostals, Christian Scientists, Unitarians, all preach a heretical view of the Trinity and that leads to judgment. We should seek to remember our history and to remember our Bibles, because those versions are not true in any real biblical sense or historical sense at all. The Bible reveals our triune God, that we get to know who he is and all of his mystery and all of his wonder without trying to oversimplify this for our finite minds. I heard a lecture in seminary once. We had a guest lecturer who came in and he was lecturing on Trinitarian theology. And I so appreciated. He was quoting a guy named Gregory of Nazi Ansus as a church father. So don't get humbled on his last name. He's like 3rd, 4th century, so has nothing to do with the Nazis, just has an unfortunate last name for history. But he was quoting Gregory who said, I cannot think on the one without quickly being circled by the splendor of the three, nor can I discern the three without being straightway carried back to the One. And the lecturer was making a point that we should be overwhelmed by the threeness of our God, that our God is three. And we were so blown away and captivated by his three ness that we should run back to the oneness of God and see who our God is as the one true God. And we've thought too much of the oneness of our God. We should be driven to the splendor of the three ness of God and be driven back between three and one, three and one. And to keep our minds always there. And I've always found that to be wildly helpful for my soul. To think of our God as the one true God, and also to think about the Father and how loving and how wonderful he is, and how sovereign and wonderful our God is, and think of Christ and His beautiful work that's been given to us that we don't deserve, and to think of the nearness of the Spirit at work in us. We should be thinking about our God in trinitarian language, in our souls, in our speech regularly.
So that's our first two commitments. The Bible is God's revelation of Himself to us. And I accept it as the authority over my life. And the God that revealed the scripture reveals has existed forever as a trinity. God the Father, God the Son, Jesus, and God the Holy Spirit. These two commitments are foundational, foundational to Christian belief. If you reject them, you're in danger of judgment. Listen, they cannot be just nice thought exercises. They can't just be neat ideas that are just floating. That we ascent. We agree. We agree to. It's like, yeah, I get that. And then just mentally agree with it without believing in it, building our life upon it and orienting our reality in line with it. Because if we don't do that, we're in danger. This cannot be just head knowledge. It cannot be. I mean, you can, with head knowledge, agree that gravity exists. In theory. You can have mental agreement that says, you know what? Yeah, it makes sense. It's a decent idea. In theory, that makes sense. But if you don't actually believe in gravity, if you don't actually orient your life as if gravity is a reality, you're in danger. You will find yourself on the Gervais street bridge thinking, I don't know, I mean, maybe it's true. Mentally it makes sense. But I also, I think I can invent my own beliefs here. Maybe I can fly. Maybe I'll float off this bridge. And if you do that, you will crash into the congaree. And if the crash doesn't kill you, one of those gators they've been taking pictures of near the bridge will snatch you up. You can't. This, this cannot be just mental. Yeah, yeah, no, no. Our reality has to be built upon this. And if it does, if that's not what we do, we are in trouble. We're in danger. But life is so much better when we orient ourselves on what is actually true and build our lives upon that.
So I have two challenges as we close up to think through these two commitments as we want to grow in this as Christians. And the first is we become people of the Word. That we should be a people that make the scriptures central in our lives and fight to do this over and over again. I have a few different ways we can do this. The first is we see that our worship is centered in the word of God. That our worship is centered in the word of God. That as we gather here on Sundays to realize and to celebrate that the Word is primary, that we begin with a call to worship that comes from the scriptures. When you hear the call to worship, you should not just be checking out and be thinking of other things, but should be thinking about the words that we are reading. That point to who our God is. That we have scripture readings, liturgy readings that we should not check out from. We should actually clue it and see the importance of reading the Word out loud together. That we should realize that our songs are chosen not haphazardly. There's a team that chooses songs that align with what we're teaching, that align with, that help teach us wonderful theology that we can sing deep into our souls and to sing that joyfully in a way that helps the Word be centered in our heart. This is why we preach sermons from the Bible and honestly why we do this. Most of our sermons are just going through books of the Bible. That's most of our teaching. Over 80% of our teaching is what's called expository preaching. For theology nerds, that'll mean something to you. For others of you, it just means that we're going through books of the Bible verse by verse, expositing the text, helping understand who our God is. And this. Most of our preaching is just going through books of the Bible. And every now and then we'll do a topical series like this. But we do that because a honestly topical series, not our best. Our best stuff is just being honest with you. It's harder for us. It's a lot easier, and it makes a lot more sense just to go through books of the Bible. But the more important reason is we just want to walk through the Bible. And if we're in charge and we get to pick text here, here, here and there, we're going to pick things that we want. I'd rather just pick books of the Bible, walk through them, not skip things, lean into the difficult stuff and get the Word into our hearts. And that's what our teaching is. Our teaching is scriptures centered in the scriptures. But we have to be, as a people, mindful of this and joyfully embracing this. The Word of God should be central in our worship. And when we leave here, every. Every time we leave on Sunday, we say the church is plan A for advancing the kingdom, for advancing the Gospel. There is no plan B. We mean that. Which means that our evangelism needs to be centered in the Word of God. That when we leave here and we take the word that we've been given, our evangelism needs to be centered in the Word of God. Which means that when we talk to people who are not believers, it cannot just be wise and persuasive arguments. Those can be helpful. But if you never get to the gospel that flows from the scriptures, you're not actually preaching the gospel. But if you think that preaching the gospel is just friending someone, befriending someone, which we should do as Christians, we should be the most hospitable, the best of friends, the most reliable. But being a friend to someone isn't the gospel. It's not. There's a phrase that gets thrown around quite a bit that says, use the gospel, preach the gospel, and if necessary, use words. And it gets attributed to somebody who didn't even say that. But that guiding ethos has for the last few decades just made us be, okay, I'll just share the gospel of my life. And it's like, no, you can live out the gospel in a way that makes the gospel compelling, but you have to say words. You got to declare who Jesus is. You should memorize some scriptures. You should know how to break down Romans 6:23 and sit with someone and help them see who God is. Our evangelism should be word centered. As we scatter into community groups. That's the third thing. Our groups are word centered. We come together as groups regularly and we study the Word because there's power in the word of God exposing the thoughts and intentions of our hearts. Hebrews 4:12 that we should see this. And as we are walking with other Christians, we should point each other to the Word. That means an accountability that when someone is sinning, we should lovingly and winsomely compel them from the scriptures to say, hey, here's what obedience looks like. One of the things we say is when we practice is we use the phrase good news before good advice. What that means is that when someone shares a problem, we don't want to jump to, okay, here's a bunch of life advice to be able to fix that. No, we want to start with the Gospel. We want to pause and say, hey, can I remind you of who you are in Christ? That your identity doesn't come from your work. It doesn't come from what you do in the office. Your identity comes from the God who saved you, who redeemed you, who set you apart to love him and delight in him. And one of the ways you do that is you actually glorify him in your work. But step one, like you need to believe that first. Now let's talk about your problem outside of that or flowing out of that. But that comes from the scriptures. Those ideas, the gospel comes from the Scriptures. We should be word centered in how we point one of the two Christ and our groups and our groups needed to continue in being word centered. We should be mindful of if the majority of things that we are saying are absent and detached from the Scriptures and we should course correct if that is the case. Fourth thing, our care is centered in the Word. The way that we care for one another is centered in the Word of God. That goes back to something similar. I just said that when someone has an idea about how to care for someone, we want to be able to take everything, every idea and filter that through the Word of God and see, is that biblical? Does that make sense in light of the teachings of the Scriptures? Because we want to be Bible people in how we care for one another. We want to be able to think scripturally and give Scripture when it's appropriate. Our pastoral counseling, which we do, is that at times it can be complex in the things that we go through, but ultimately at its root core, it's simply walking with other people who are struggling and helping them see. Do you see who God is in His Word? Do you see how knowing him and how delighting in him actually exposes some of the things in our own life? The brokenness, the sin, the struggles, the idolatry? We want to be a people whose care is centered in the Word of God. And lastly, we want to have spiritual disciplines that are centered in the Word of God. We want to be a people who stay disciplined in His Word in a way that truly takes the Scriptures, adores them, and meditates on them day and night. I want to be like that picture that we just read earlier and sang about in Psalm 1. It's planted in the streams of water that flow from our God and the living and abiding Word of God that bear fruit in our lives in wonderful ways. And I know over the years I've heard the popular rebuttal that says, okay, yeah, I mean, I get it, yeah, read your Bible. You know, I've been told that and I've done that and it didn't work. And as I've heard this over the years, I've thought about my own soul in this. What I've realized is I don't think we truly understand what it means to actually be rooted in the Word of God like we're supposed to. I don't think we truly understand what it means to meditate regularly in the Word of God. I think what happens is that, that our souls are so over entertained, so easily distracted, so glued to our phones that we are so now oriented to experience 20 second clips in a way that has made us so distracted, that the idea that we think is that alongside that we can Inject a few minutes of the Word in our day, here or there, every few days. And that. That somehow is supposed to counteract all of the things that we fill our soul with that rob us of joy in Christ. And God sometimes does, in those few moments, supernaturally, just in his wonderful power, work through the Word in that moment and reorient our souls. But often what happens in the lives of ordinary Christians in ordinary days is regularly meditating upon the Word of God in a way that seems saturates our souls so that when we are walking through whatever we're walking through, we're able to see it through the lens of the Gospel. And that's different, y'. All. When you study the faith of the people of old, of centuries ago, it's like they'd wake up and they'd read the Word of God and they wouldn't just leave it there. They'd pick it up and they meditated on it throughout the day. And they continue to think about it, continue to process it and chew on it and enjoy it. And then as the day closes, as their evenings close, they come back to the Word and they'd read it and they'd enjoy it. And even those Christians walked through seasons that were dry, that felt like a spiritual desert. But they persevered knowing that the path to getting to the other side of that is to continue to stay disciplined in beholding who our God is and His Word. So when I hear, yeah, I read my Bible, it didn't do anything for me. I'm just like, I don't know if we actually did. Not in the way the Scriptures outline, not in the way that we're supposed to. Not in the way that God invites us into. No, I don't. We cannot reject the power of God's Word as people under the authority of God's Word and make God the least influential position on our screens and in our souls. That cannot be. And I feel this, y'. All. I feel this personally right now. So as we look at our commitments, I know some of our commitment is going to cover this. We need to come back to being men and women who are disciplined in the Word of God, which means at times you're going to read things that you don't like. You're going to read the Scriptures and go, I don't know if I'd like that. One of the things I've appreciated over the years of walking with people is at times when you come up against something in the Bible that says, I don't like this. It's like that's okay. But in faith, trust the God who wrote it. And in faith what you'll see is that over time you may not like that, but at time you'll grow to believe that is actually ultimately what is good for you. And that God willing, he's going to change our hearts. That we might love the things that we once did not like at all. But that takes discipline and that takes some pursuit and that takes making God central in our lives. We should be people of the Word.
The second and the last is we should become people of God, become Bible people and God centered people. People love God. I don't mean that in a way that says that this is how you make yourself a Christian. That's not what I mean. I mean that if you're in Christ, we should be just of God in a way that Jesus taught when he said, pursue God with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul. That we should be a people. That our intellect and our affections, our emotions, our whole being is oriented towards our triune God. We should think about God the Father in a way that says, I love our heavenly, my heavenly Father. That he's a better Father than any earthly Father I could have. He's a better authority figure than any authority figure I could have. That I'm going to trust in my heavenly Father. That I want to behold Christ the Son and think about all the ways every day as I sin, every day as I struggle to remember Jesus. Thank you that you bled and you died for my struggles, for my brokenness. That we remember the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives in a way that helps us remember that every moment of our lives, in every room, God is present with us. To believe that, that God is present with us. That even when we can't feel it, we know by faith he's with us. We should think and dwell and enjoy our triune God. One of the normative ways to do this is through prayer is to seek our triune God in prayer. Jesus taught the normative pattern of prayer is to the Father. So we should pray normally to the Father. Most of the prayer you see in the New Testament is to the Father, our Father who lives in heaven. But we also should pray with the rest of the Trinity in mind with Christ the Son and the Holy Spirit and be trinitarian and how we think about prayer. To think about God the Father that we are submitting to and enjoying in prayer. And Christ our great High Priest who offers our prayers to the Father and the Holy Spirit who prays for us when we don't know what to say ourselves. Our God is wonderful and he is good and we should orient our souls to toward our triune God and be God centered people, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, one true God. And if we make him our pursuit, make him the goal of our affections, of our desires, God will form us in the people that he's called us to be. And I believe that if we build our lives on these first two commitments we walk through that we will set a foundation that is meant to last. That we will build our lives on a foundation that will not crumble. Y', all, I have. I'm serious. I have watched friends who seemed like they were on fire for Jesus, that raised their hands and worshiped and knew all the right phrases and knew all the right correct answers, who did not build their life on this foundation, who began to question the Bible, who began to question the validity of it, who became skeptical, who began to slowly drift in a way that they didn't just walk away from God, they became enemies of God and to this day are still throwing stones at Jesus and his movement. It is important for us to evaluate what are we building our life upon. What is the foundation that everything is built upon? These two commitments are vital for building a foundation that will last.
Let me close with the words of Jesus at the end of the Sermon on the mount in Matthew 7 and I want you to hear these if you have to close your eyes to focus, do so. But I want you to hear what Jesus says to us. He says, everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.
> Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. 25 And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. 26 And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. 27 And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it. (Matthew 7:24–27 ESV)
What he just said is that everyone who hears my words hears Christ's words, believes, trusts, obeys, and builds their life upon them. It's like a wise person who built their house on the rock. Verse 25 and the rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock. That when the storms of this life shift you and beat upon you, when you feel suffering and trials and the storms of temptation, everything that begins to shake, you won't shift off of the rock because you were built on a solid foundation. He goes on to say, and everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house and it fell. And great was the fall it that Jesus warns and says, if you don't build your life upon me, upon Christ, upon our triune God who's revealed himself in his word. If you don't, it will not last. And when the storms of life come, you will be shifted. But we as a church resolve to commit ourselves to be built upon the rock that is Christ. These two foundational commitments are vital. And if we will build our lives upon pursuing and knowing and delighting and trusting our God and His Word, so that we might know who God is and respond to him in faith and repentance and delighting in him and trusting him and walking out joyfully in obedience, we will stand.
Let's pray. Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us begin. Some of us begin to see the beauty of the scriptures that reveal who you are. That we would not believe in anything else, in anyone else, that we would build our lives upon you as our solid rock and faith foundation. But Lord, that comes through your redemptive work in our hearts, through helping us to see you more clearly and growing in us spiritual fruit that helps us know you in Jesus name. Amen.
We're going to respond here by taking the Lord's Supper. I want to read from Mark chapter 14 to prepare our hearts to take the Lord's Supper. Here Jesus.
> And as they were eating, he took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to them, and said, "Take; this is my body." And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. And he said to them, "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many. Truly, I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God." (Mark 14:22–25 ESV)
That when Jesus was sitting with them and he took the bread and he broke and he took the cup of the new covenant, he said, this is my work done for you. The second member of the Trinity looking at us saying, I love you so much that I came to have my blood shed for you. And if you're a Christian and your life is built upon the rock that is Christ, you get to in a moment joyfully come to the table confessing our sin, but confessing our wonderful Savior as revealed to us in the word of God. So in a moment, prepare your heart. There's gluten free back in that back corner over there. But come and take the Lord's Supper. But hear this. If you are not a Christian, if you haven't trusted in Christ My hope is this morning is you would not come to the table, but you would come to Christ. You would place your faith in him, and you'd build your life on the wonderful foundation that is our God. But when you're ready, come.
Re:Member The Why and What of Membership
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Spencer. I am one of the pastors here. So we, as I said last week, we are taking a break. We just finished up First Samuel and we are not going to jump straight into Second Samuel. We're going to do that in the new year. We're going to do a series called re member series called Remember. We'll do that through the fall and then we'll do give series and we'll come back to Second Samuel. We're excited about this series. This is an opportunity for us to revisit and remember what it means to be a member of this church. See how clever we are with titles, you guys. There you go. One clap. It's an opportunity for us to revisit what it means to be a member of this church. So we're going to over the next few months walk through our membership commitments and revisit the things that bind us together as beliefs and practices. And then if you are a member of this church, we'll have the opportunity this fall to actually recommit to membership. We're excited about that and we're going to have more information about that at our upcoming family meeting. So make sure that you are there if you're a committed member of our church, to be at family meeting. But we're thankful that we get to walk through this over the next couple months. These 14 different membership commitments that we have before we jump into those commitments today, I want to look at the why and the what of membership. We need to look at the why and the what of membership before we jump into what we actually commit to as a church. Because some folks will pose the question, why membership in the first place? Why do you have membership? Why belong to a church? Some people ask, is church membership even biblical? Like, where do you get this idea? So we're going to examine that idea while also being clear about what it means to be a member of this church. Like what is our membership commitment all about? And there's some language that we use that is going to sound very familiar, that if you ask what does it mean to be a member of of Mill City Church of Cayce, There's a phrase that will show up as we walk through this today. I know it's going to blow your mind like you've never heard it before. But we are a gospel centered community on mission. It's the language we use over and over again. I'm pretty sure it's on the wall somewhere in the lobby. But there's a reason we are that and there is a Reason why that really defines who we are as a church. And we're going to see that as we walk through why membership, but also what it means to be a member of this church. So I want to pray for us and then we will walk through this together.
Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us have ears to hear this morning. I pray that you might help us see why it is good to belong, why it is good to commit to following you, to delighting in you, to loving one another, to being obedient, to take the gospel to our city. God, I pray you'd help us be present and we'd be not just hearers of the Word, but we would be doers of the Word. As we trust you, we ask this in Jesus name. Amen.
All right, so why do we practice church membership? Someone will ask, where in the Bible do you find the command to be a member of a local church? Now, this may come as a shock to some of you, but you're not going to find any one verse in the Bible that commands for you to be a part of a church through church membership. There's no Third Corinthians that shows up and says, and be a member of a local church and submit to the elders of that local church. There's not any one verse that really makes this crystal clear, which is if there was, it might make the conversation about membership a little bit easier over the years as we've had it. But what you will see is as you look through the Scriptures, you'll see that God is doing something in setting up his church. And that's what I want to do. For the first part in answering why membership? I want to do what's I want to do a biblical theology of church membership, which is going from the Old Testament to the New Testament to see how God is developing this people that is going to belong to him, with him at the center to declare His Excellencies to a lost world. So that's what I want to do, starting off in the Old Testament, in the book of Genesis. So God chooses in the Book of Genesis, Abraham that he's going to form a people through. He promises Abraham he's going to have a great nation that's made through him. And in this selection of Abraham, we see that God is going to have a unique, special relationship with him and his people, unlike the rest of humanity. And there's this promise of this great nation, this great people that he's going to bless the nations through. And then when you get to the next Book of The Bible, the second book, the book of Exodus. You see that God takes his descendants, the twelve tribes of Israel who have been slaves in Egypt. He brings them out of Egypt. And when they're wandering in the wilderness in Exodus 19, you see really the formation and the formal covenant relationship that God establishes with his people. And in Exodus 19 he tells his people in verse 5,
> Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.
These are the words he shall speak to the people of Israel. Then he tells them that you are my treasured possession. And as this is going to play out, he's going to take this people, his treasured possession to the promised land. He's going to set himself up in the center of his people to be a God centered people that are uniquely his, unlike any other aspect of creation, unlike any other people. And that this people is going to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. This people was meant to be separate from the nations that look different, that proclaim the excellencies of God as a light to the surrounding nations. And then this is Exodus 19, right before Moses goes up to Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments. When he gets the Ten Commandments, you see the first four commandments and the Ten Commandments are God centered commandments. This is how to have right relationship with God and worshiping God alone. And then the next six are how to live in good community with one another, how to love one another, how to trust one another, don't lie, don't murder, don't steal. And then the rest of the Old Testament law is really expounding upon those 10 Commandments. It's helping them see in their context, in their time, this is what it means to be a people who has God at the center, who loves one another fiercely in a community that takes care of one another, that looks separate from the nations, that declares how good our God is. And when you read the rest of the Old Testament, you see a people that most of the time falls on their face in trying to live that out, that over and over again. They don't put God at the center, they worship other gods, they don't love each other, they don't serve each other, they take advantage of one another. And instead of looking separate than the nations in order to show how good their God is, they look just like the nations. And that is the reason that they need a Savior and there's this hope from the prophets proclaiming this Savior is going to come. And then Jesus comes.
Flip to the New Testament. When Jesus comes, he begins to develop this with new and better language. You see, if you just take the Gospel of Matthew, just start there. When you start reading the Gospel of Matthew, you're going to see what God is doing. In Matthew chapter 4, Jesus begins His ministry by preaching the gospel, proclaiming the gospel of his kingdom that is coming, and declaring the good news. And then he also chooses a people. He chooses the 12 disciples, these disciples whom he's going to build his church through. He begins teaching them. You keep flipping. Go to Matthew chapter five through Matthew chapter seven. You read the Sermon on the Mount. This is a retelling of the law and new and really better language, showing the heart of God all along for his people. What it looks like to put God at the center, what it looks like to take sin seriously, to live in community. We see some of this and more teaching, more of his ministry. When you get to Matthew chapter 11, you see that he commissions out his disciples. He puts them on a mission trip to begin to declare the good news of the Gospel to the people in the surrounding areas. You keep reading the Gospel of Matthew, you see more teaching, you see more of his work and his ministry. And then you get to Matthew chapter 18. And then Jesus begins to use a word to describe what this people is going to be, that he's making this new covenant people, and that is the church. The Greek word for that is ekklesia. It means church or assembly. And it shows up in Matthew 18. And Jesus begins to describe what this church is going to look like. It's going to be a people who take sin seriously, who hold each other accountable, who practice radical forgiveness. That is unlike the rest of the world. Jesus continues to teach. He continues to form his people. He continues to disciple his disciples. And then it is time for him to do the work that no one can do. He does the work of salvation. He takes his perfect record of righteousness with him to the cross. He dies on the cross for our sins because we were unable to to obey the law. He dies on the cross, taking judgment upon himself. He conquers death at the resurrection, removing the power of death over his people. And then he looks at his disciples at the end of Matthew and he tells them,
> Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.
He tells them, you're going to take everything that you've learned from me over the last three years. This message of the gospel that I came to redeem you and save you. This message of what it looks like to be a people that are committed to having God at the center and loving one another. Well, you're going to take that to the nations where they're going to hear the gospel and believe and you can read Mark and Luke and John and you're going to see this story over and over again. Then you get the book of Acts where Jesus ascends to the right hand of God the Father being king over all creation. And then the Holy Spirit descends upon his people and the church begins in Acts 2. You read that Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit stands up, preaches the first sermon at Pentecost and 3,000 people, people place plus people place their faith in Jesus and are baptized. And then we see some of the very first acts of this church and responding to Christ in faith and baptism. It says in verse 42. We'll have more time to study this exact passage in community group this week. I just want to hit some of the highlights to help us see what God is doing here. In verse 42 he says,
> And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.
That's the teachings of Christ. They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching. They were a gospel centered people. And it continues into the fellowship and the breaking of bread and prayers. You go to verse 44.
> And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need.
That they were a people that believed the gospel, devoted themselves to that teaching, but they devoted themselves to one another. They fellowshiped together, they broke bread together, they took care of each other's needs. They saw their brothers and sisters in Christ as more important than money and material things. And they're selling their stuff so that they can take care of one another. And then it goes in verse 47 and finishes.
> And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.
That this message continues to be introduced to people who hear and believe and are brought into the church to continue to be a gospel centered community on mission to take the gospel to the world that desperately needed it. The church in Jerusalem continues to expand as you follow the story. Keep flipping through Acts. All of a sudden God has a plan to see scatter his people and involves the death of one of his servants, Stephen. He ordains the death of Stephen who's proclaiming the Good news of Jesus Christ and he's murdered for it. And in Acts chapter eight, after he's martyred, it says, and Saul approved of his execution. And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem. And they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. And now we see that the plan is spreading, that it's not just a church in Jerusalem now, it's in Judea and it's in Samaria. And the church is going global. One of the ways this has been described is that the church globally is the big sea church in creeds. That's called the Catholic Church. It's not referring to the Catholic denomination, but the Catholic meaning universal. That there's this global, universal church bound together by Christ. But it's not just in Jerusalem, it's in Judea, it's in Samaria. It's scattered in communities across the world in local churches. That's usually called the little C church. But there are little C churches who are forming together with Christ at the center, seeking to be what God has called them. Now the church is spreading past Jerusalem. And then that man who was involved in the killing of Stephen Saul in Acts chapter nine is on his way to persecute more Christians. And then Jesus blinds him, converts him. And then we know him mostly as Paul. And then Paul is set apart to take this even further. And he plants churches all over Asia Minor, all over Europe. And the church begins to spread and expand. As you continue to read the Book of Acts, you see the gospel spreading all over that region. But as these churches are getting established and they're seeking to be a gospel centered people that are taking the gospel to the nations as they're seeking to be this, they start to run into problems. They start to run into different things, different sins, different struggles. There's a bunch of people who the thing that the. The central binding idea that holds them together is Christ. But they're very, very different. Different ethnicities, different cultures, different classes. And as you continue to read the rest of the New Testament, you see that God had a plan for this, that he starts to write letters, inspired scripture through servants like Paul to these churches to help them see what it means to be a gospel centered people. How to fight for what is good, how to repent of sin, how to live in community, how to still have some missional hustle to take the gospel to the nations. But when you read the beginnings of these letters, you see very clearly that these are individual churches. I'll run through a Bunch of them. Really quickly. The letter to the Corinthians, in First Corinthians, Chapter one, it says, to the church of God that is in Corinth, that is that church in that city with their unique issues. This is a letter to that church. Not all the churches, though all the churches, will eventually benefit from this, helping us see now it's not just one global church. There's individual churches where these people belong to one another and have their own leaders and their own issues they're facing. It continues to the churches of Galatia, that's a whole region of different churches that Paul planted in his first missionary journey. To the saints who are in Ephesus, that's the book of Ephesians. To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, that's the book of Philippians. To the church of Thessalonians and God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, that's the church in Thessalonica. You start to see that there is one global church made up of individuals, communities of Christians who are seeking to be centered in Christ, loving one another fiercely and taking the Gospel to their friends and their neighbors. And you follow that thread all the way through the letters and you'll get to the end. The Book of Revelation, which we did last year. And as we saw the Book of Revelation, it's not just apocalyptic literature. It's not just proclaiming what's going to happen. It is also a letter written to seven churches. Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea, and as we saw last year, all churches with different problems, with different sins, some needing encouragement, all of them mostly needing a smack across the face from Jesus. But those are all individual churches where those people belong to Christ and. And one another seeking to be obedient in following him and taking the Gospel to those who needed it. So that's Genesis to Revelation. While you're not going to find one specific verse that makes this so clear, what you can see from start to finish is that God had a plan to form a people. And that plan was to be localized in churches where there were people that were so deeply committed to following Christ and having a zeal and a desire to worship and delight in him over all things, to be a people, a community that so deeply loved one another and cared for one another, that looked radically different than the rest of the world. So much so that historians at the time were looking at these Christians and saying there's something different about them. And to be a people who are not so self focused that they were going to use their energy and their effort and their time and their money and their lives lives to proclaim the good news to those who didn't know. That is God's plan for redemption. One global church working through individual local churches all around the world. That is God's plan for the church. So when someone says I don't see membership in the Bible, I just want to say it's, you got to read the whole story. You need to see what God is doing. You need to see God's plan for redemption that is through the local church.
I was talking to a pastor a few weeks back and he was telling me a story about a guy who had been coming to their church and he said, did this guy come? And he was kind of coming for weeks and they started to introduce the idea, maybe you should think about committing here. And he said, oh no, I don't believe membership is biblical. He's like, I'm a part of the big C church, we're all a part of the same church, but I'm not going to commit to membership here. And he was kind of taken aback and he engaged with the conversation. He said, okay, take what you're saying, so you're a member of the big sea, the, the big church universal. He said, yeah. He said, okay, well am I like a pastor in this big old church in the world? And he said, yeah. He said okay, so does it make me like your pastor? He said, yeah. He said, alright, let me share with you Hebrews chapter 13. He said,
> Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.
He said, do you believe that's true? He said, yeah. He said, okay, so if I'm your pastor and you're gonna submit to me, you should go through the membership process at our church. He just laid it out for him and the guy said no and he left and he never came back. And I thought that was quite the clever way to be able to explain and poke holes in the guy's argument. But that passage is incredibly helpful. You read the New Testament letters and you see that God has structured for these local communities that he has pastors, elders that are overseeing the church. So when I look at that passage, obey your leaders and submit to them. It's helpful for me when I'm talking to people about membership. It's like, I belong to this church, I'M one of the pastors of this church. I belong to them, they belong to me. My people aren't down the road. They're the brothers and sisters. They're not across town, they're not across the world. I don't pastor them, I don't oversee their souls. I don't answer for their souls. No, it's this people. And you see that God has a plan and even the oversight of his church. And I think this is important, especially in Southern culture. And here's why. In Southern culture, pretty much still everyone, if you ask them, are you a Christian? They're gonna say, yeah. The overwhelming majority of people in the south are still gonna say, yeah, I'm a Christian. And if you begin to press into that, a lot of times it's, well, I'm Methodist or I'm Presbyterian or Episcopalian, or I'm Baptist or I'm Catholic. And it's like, what does that mean? I was just born Christian, I was born a Methodist. And as you look at the scriptures, you're not born a Christian. And if you continue to press into this, what you also see is there are a lot of people that claim the name of Christ that don't really belong anywhere. They don't commit to any people, don't commit to the Lord locally anywhere. They're just free floating in a way that is so foreign to the scriptures. And then what you'll also see is you'll see people that go, yeah, I mean, I don't really, not really. I don't really, I'm not a member anywhere. I, I like this church for the worship. I like this church for the teaching. I like this church for their Bible studies, like this church for their small groups. I like this church for their outreach. And I kind of just, you know, take everywhere like it's a buffet. And it's like, man, to make the church of Jesus Christ for your own benefit is so foreign to what the scriptures teach about the church that is not the church that Jesus bled and died for. You should be committed to God and his people somewhere. And my hope is that as you look at the grand story, you'll see, yes, you should belong. You should be a member of a church somewhere. Christians are not designed to be outside of the church or just not. And over the next couple months, I hope we continue to see that over and over again as we walk through this.
Now that's the why of why we should belong to a church. Now I just want to, as we end look at the what, what does it mean to belong to this church? And it's gonna sound like a broken record, but it's a good one. It's a record we spend every Sunday. It's what Chet Phillips calls the bee's knees of belonging, which I don't know why he calls it that, but it's really important to us. And that is being a gospel centered community on mission. And that's what you're going to see over the next two months. Walking through this, you're going to see 14 different commitments that highlight that. So let's start with that first part. What does it mean to be gospel centered? It means that we are a church that is bound together by. By one shared story. And that story is the message of the gospel. We are bound together by this one shared story in a way that not just defines us at the beginning in belief, but defines us in belief and practice the rest of our lives. If you look at the American story, okay, if you look at the American story at the beginning, you see that it's a group of people that are anti tyranny. Okay? No taxation without representation. No king's going to tell us what to do. You'll see that it's a people that love freedom, freedom of expression, freedom of worship, freedom of speech. Don't step on my freedoms. You'll see that it's a people that have some hustle, some dogged determination to exist. That's how America began. But that's also the story that permeates through its people throughout time, that even today, Americans don't like kings. Don't tell me what I can and cannot do. We like freedom and there's still some dogged determination to exist. That's the American spirit and it still flows through its people. And we as Christians have a much better story. We as Christians have a much better story. That's not just our origin story, but it permeates through us in our lives. It is the story of Jesus Christ. It is the story of a God who looked on humanity, that rejected him, that spit upon his goodwill, that decided that they wanted to worship what they wanted to worship and find what they thought fulfilling and rejected him over and over again. And God and His mercy does not give us judgment. He sends His Son that Christ comes and he dies on the cross for sinners. And he conquers death at the resurrection. And he gives us grace that we don't deserve to be in relationship with Him. And he forms us more into his image through his work, through his will and desire and good pleasure and that story continues to work within his people. It is the story that saves us, but it's the story that sustains us. In the same way that as foreigners come to America and they become American citizens and in a lot of ways embody the American spirit in beautiful ways, they start loving freedom. They start. They have this dogged determination within them. We do not belong to this world as Christians. Scriptures say that we have. Our citizenship is in heaven. From we have with a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, that we are part of the world that is to come. And as citizens of that kingdom here on this earth, as sojourners and strangers and foreigners, that we embody what it means to belong to him more than anything else. So what we'll see over the next coming weeks as we walk through these commitments, we'll see what it means to be a gospel centered people bound together by that story. But we will also see what it means to be a community. What it means to be a gospel centered community. One of the metaphors that we see in the New Testament for the church, for the this community is the body. So Romans 12, we'll talk about one body, many members. So one body, different body parts, different members of the body in a way that each person is doing their gift to be able to serve one another well. And man, when you see that actually in practice, when you experience what it means to belong to the church of Jesus Christ and have different members of the body who, who love and serve you, it is a glorious story. I mean, if you ever see someone who loses their job, which is a massive loss, and they're crushed, and then someone in their group finds out, and all of a sudden their whole group is messaging them saying, hey, we love you, like we're praying for you. You need to know that your identity is not in the work that you do. Your identity is in the God who loves you, who sustains you. God's going to provide for you. He's going to take care of you, we're going to take care of you. But you need to remember the gospel. And then all of a sudden, they're behind the scenes organizing things. By the time he gets home, there's already been a meal delivered and there's meals to be delivered the next few days. All of a sudden someone else in the church hears about this and they put $1,000 in an envelope and drop it on the doorstep. And all of a sudden he's being provided for, his family's being loved. And then more people in the church find out all of A sudden they ask, can we be praying about this? That you would find a new job that ends up in our prayer message that goes out to our members. Now the whole church is praying and then someone else in the church hears about that and says, wait a second, I know what he does for a living. I got a friend who's hiring for that position right now. They reach out and say, hey, hey, can you talk to this, Talk to my friend. He's hiring. And then within a week, he's already got a job lined up. When you see the church respond like that over and over and over and over again, it makes me so thankful for the church of Jesus Christ and how his church responds over and over again. We've seen this over and over again in our church and it's wonderful. And I wish in some ways more of those stories were told. I know why we don't. Because we don't let the left hand know what the right is doing. I get that. But the stories that go viral are the church hurt stories. And yes, those stories exist. They're real stories with real pain. I'm not denying the existence of them. But boy, oh boy, the amount of church help stories where people rally around one another, it's like 100 to 1 to 1 compared to that. The church is a wonderful people to belong to, to see them in action over and over and over again because they're centered in Christ in a way that helps us, by the power of the Holy Spirit, see something beyond our own interest. And when you see it in action, it's beautiful. It's a family. And that's the language of the New Testament. Often when it talks about the church and is family. When you start learning New Testament Greek, one of the first, you start with the vocabulary words that are the most, most used in the New Testament. And one of the first words you learn in Greek is adelphoi, it's the word for brothers and sisters. Because it shows up over and over and over again in the scriptures to talk about God's people, that we are a family, that we are brothers and sisters in Christ. Paul, when he's making converts, talks about his converts like spiritual children. That we are a family, that we love one another, that we belong to one another. And when you study the Book of Acts, you see this. The church functions like a family. I was trying to explain this to someone recently. I was trying to explain this concept and I was just saying, listen, I'm close with my earthly family. I'm close with my parents, my brothers, and my sisters, like we are, we're close, but boy, oh boy, there's some eternal depth that I have with brothers and sisters in this church that when crap hits the fan in my life, the first few messages are not to family. And that's not to lower my earthly family. I'm real close with them. It's to elevate what the importance of church family is here. And when it hits the fan, I'm messaging people in this church and I got people in this church who rally around in wonderful ways. To belong to a family that fiercely loves God and one another is beautiful, it's compelling, it's wonderful. It is so good to belong to the Church of Jesus Christ. And as you walk through the membership commitment with us over the next couple of months, you're going to see this. You're going to see how we fight for this, how this is so unbelievably important to us. We want to be a gospel centered people. We want to be a community that's like a family, but we also want to take this thing that we hold dear to those who don't believe. We're a gospel centered community on mission. And that's what we're also going to see in our membership commitment. We do not exist to be a holy huddle. We do not exist to be inwardly focused. We exist to take this wonderful news that brought us from death to life, to people, to friends, to neighbors, to co workers so that they might taste and see that the Lord is good and be brought into the family of God. We care deeply about this.
Now, one of the downsides to you using the word membership is because sometimes the word membership in our culture has a consumeristic bent. I mean, you could be a member of Costco. It's a pretty low commitment. You pay, what is it, 80 bucks a year? You know, and then you get to go and buy all sorts of bulk goods that certainly will, certainly some of it will spoil in your cabinets because it's just hard to use up all that stuff before it goes bad. Maybe your family's better than ours. We couldn't do it. Or Walmart. Plus, that's not important. There's a consumeristic nature sometimes to the word membership that makes it about self, that makes it about our interest. And I still think the word membership is worth fighting for. I still think it's worth reclaiming from our culture to help us see that it is not about self, that membership is about something bigger than us. It's about a people who leverage their time and their Talents and their energy and their money and their efforts and their lives so that others who do not know Christ, others who are sprinting towards an eternity apart from God under his wrath, who desperately need to know the love of a savior who bled and died for them, that it's worth our energy and our hustle and our grit to take that. To those who don't believe. It's not a country club. It's more like a military outpost. The membership we have here, we don't want to be a country club. Country club is low commitment. You pay your fee, you get to go play golf, get to enjoy the pool, but you don't keep the greens and you don't scrub the pool. We don't want to be that. We want to be more like a military outpost. Our country has military outposts all over the world. And the members of the US Military who are at those outposts, they are there to serve the interest of America. They. They're there to serve the interests of their commander in chief. They are there bound together, laser focused, whether it's promoting the values of America in that area of the world or at times, whether it's fighting a war, but they are laser focused, committed to the mission of America. And we have something so much better than that. We are citizens of a kingdom that is not of this world. And we serve a king who. Who reigns for eternity. And we get to serve him in a land that we do not belong to, that is foreign to us. And we get to serve his interests taking the gospel to people who do not know him, making enemies, friends, making the lost found, making the dead alive in Christ. That's what we want to be. The church is supposed to be. And I'll be honest, we've had folks in the past who came to our church looking for a country club and they just didn't stick. And we're not perfect. We got our flaws. You've been here long enough, you go learn them. But that's not what we want to be. But we've also had folks who've been there and done some of the Southern consumeristic Christianity. And they see the things that we're fighting for and they love it and they jump on and they see I do. I want to be a people that loves one another fiercely, that chases after Jesus together. That is taking the gospel to those who don't believe. I want to be a part of that. And they jump in and we hustle and we fight to be the church of the New Testament and the scriptures that we see that hustled and fought and was missional and had some dog in it. Like we want to be that type of church to missionaries, be everyday missionaries here in this city, in Columbia. So we want to be. And as we walk through the membership commitment over the next few months, this is something that is going to show up. And at times it's hard. I'm not going to lie. At times living out the ideals and the practices and the beliefs of our commitments is difficult. And what's helpful for my soul, maybe it'll be helpful for you, is I like to take the 10,000 year perspective when I think about all this stuff. 10,000 years from now, are you going to regret when you look back at this life not picking up more hobbies, not being the best pickleball player in the world, not using all your money to level up to the next part of society, to the next class, Are you going to regret not fulfilling the American dream and all of its trappings? Or are you going to be so insanely thankful that the work of the Spirit went to work in your heart in a way that helped you leverage your time and your energy and your heart's desire to be a people so deeply centered on the gospel, so deeply, fiercely loving one another and so outwardly focused that you took the gospel to some of your co workers who currently right now are walking as enemies of the cross of Christ because you love them, because you served them, because you stood in the way between them and hell and said Jesus is better than everything else. And they placed their faith in Jesus and they got baptized and they joined a group and they kept fighting to believe all the way to 10,000 years from now. They are standing in the presence of their Savior, worshiping him with you because you gave your life away to something that matters. That is what our commitment is all about. And that's what we're gonna look at the next couple of months. My hope is that for the members of this church, you'd be so deeply excited that you be so thankful for the work of Christ in our lives that we get to do this together. But if you're not new and you're checking us out, I hope you stick around. I hope my yelling didn't run you off. It's just, I'm just excited, you guys.
1 Samuel 31
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. Wow, lively this morning. It's Labor Day weekend. My name is Spencer. I am one of the pastors here. We are in 1st Samuel 31, which means that we are coming to the end of First Samuel today. So this is the final chapter. We said at the beginning that first and Second Samuel were all written together. It's one story that when they originally were recording this down, they did it in scrolls. It was too big of a story for one scroll. They split it into two, which is why we have first and Second Samuel. So there's part one, there's part two. We're finishing part one. We are not going to immediately jump into Second Samuel. We're actually going to take a break from that. We're going to do a new series starting next week called Remember, this is an opportunity for us to look at why membership is important and to look at our membership commitment. And we're going to teach through our membership commitment throughout the fall to understand what are the things that we commit to as this local body. And then we will do our give series in December and we'll return to Second Samuel in the new year sometime. So we are in 1st Samuel today, concluding it. This is the final part, really, of the downfall of Saul. We followed this story. We've seen how ugly it has gotten for him. And this chapter just kind of ends very quickly. It's a very brief description of how Saul dies, and it ends this really sad story in a hurry. So what I want to do is I want to walk through the story here of what we have today, and then I want to recap and go back to look at parts of First Samuel to really see where Saul started to go around, to see some of the decisions he made, and to see how pride and self interest ultimately became his downfall. So we'll get to recap and see First Samuel in a clip, and then we will have an opportunity to step back as Christians and look at this and see what this means for us as we try to understand this and apply the truth of the Scriptures to our lives. So I'm gonna pray for us, and then we're going to walk through this together. Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us be present to hear your word, that you give us ears to hear and that we would not just listen to what your word has to say, but we would seek to respond. God, may you bring us to faith and. And to repentance and to delighting in you over all the things in this world they would seek to rob us of life with you we ask this in Jesus name. Amen.
All right, so we're in verse one now.
> Now the Philistines fought against Israel, and the men of Israel fled before the Philistines and fell slain on Mount Gilboa.
And the Philistines overtook Saul and his sons, and the Philistines struck down Jonathan and Abinadab and Malchishua, the sons of Saul.
> And the Philistines overtook Saul and his sons, and the Philistines struck down Jonathan and Abinadab and Malchishua, Saul's sons.
So it just jumps straight into this very sad moment. If you've been following First Samuel with us, this is sad because this is the death of Jonathan. Jonathan is what was supposed to be the next king in Lyme, but he realizes fairly quickly that God has chosen David to be the anointed king. So he submits to the will of God and then he becomes a fierce friend to David, that he loves David. I mean, we see such loyalty within him. And if you remember a few chapters ago, there's this hope in him that he said, one day, David, you're going to be the throne. I'm going to be by your side. There's this hopefulness that he'll never get to see. And one of the things I appreciate here is that even as he seeks to obey the Lord and his desires, not his own, and he seeks to befriend David, that he's at his father's side, which means he's still trying to honor his father as well. Makes Jonathan one of the most beloved people in the Scriptures. But he dies in battle. Two other brothers due to Abinadab and Malka Shua. Now absent from this list of sons is Ish Bosheth, which we're going to learn more about at the beginning of 2 Samuel. There's going to be a rivalry that brews between him and David, but he's not there in the battlefield, it seems.
Now we pick up in verse three,
> And the battle pressed hard against Saul, and the archers found him, and he was badly wounded by the archers. Then Saul said to his armor-bearer, Draw your sword and thrust me through with it, lest these uncircumcised come and thrust me through and mistreat me. But his armor-bearer would not, for he feared greatly. Therefore Saul took his own sword and fell upon it. And when his armor-bearer saw that Saul was dead, he also fell upon his sword and died with him. Thus Saul died, and his three sons and his armor-bearer and all his men on the same day together.
So they're losing, they're retreating. They're retreating to Mount Gilboa, his sons have died, his army's falling. Everything that Samuel said is coming to fruition, and that he's struck, he's struck by archers. And at this point, he knows it's over. And he does not want to be overtaken by the Philistines because he knows what's going to happen. He's been a thorn in their side for decades. At this point, they get ahold of him. They're going to mistreat him. He doesn't want that. He looks at his armor bearer and says, kill me. Kill me right now. But his armor bearer would not, for he feared greatly and rightfully so. This is the Lord's anointed king. This is not a small thing for this request to come through. He's not doing this. Therefore, Saul took his own sword and fell upon it. And when his arm bearer saw that Saul was dead, he also fell upon his sword, died with them. Thus Saul died, and his three sons and his armor bearer and all his men on the same day together. Saul ends his own life. His arm bearer follows suit. And Saul, a man that grew prideful as the years went on, he decides how he is going to die.
Verse 7.
> And when the men of Israel who were on the other side of the valley and those beyond Jordan saw that the men of Israel had fled, and that Saul and his sons were dead, they abandoned their cities and fled, and the Philistines came and lived in them.
So when the people in nearby towns hear that their king of 40 years has died and they have lost the battle, they make the right decision. Because in this period of time, actually even into today, if you lose and the army is coming, you just abandon everything. You get your family, you get out. Philistines come in, they settle into these towns.
Verse 8.
> The next day, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, they found Saul and his three sons fallen on Mount Gilboa.
So they cut off his head and stripped off his armor and sent messengers throughout the land of the Philistines to carry the good news to the house of their idols and to the people. The Philistines suffered Saul under Saul and all of the battles they lost against him for 40 years. So when they are doing what you do after you win the battle and they're searching all the bodies, they're taking loot. They are trying to identify if there's any major figures that have been killed and they finally find Saul, they are ecstatic because they get the opportunity to humiliate this thorn in their side that they've Lost to for many years. And they cut off his head. And if you remember back in 1st Samuel, chapter 5, when the Ark of the Lord was captured and the ark of the Lord is brought into the Philistines, the temple of Dagon, the Lord cuts the head of the false God and that statue off. And that's as we established then, that's a sign of dominance and humiliation against your enemy. That's why David, after he defeats Goliath, he cuts off his head. It's a sign of dominance and humiliation of your enemy. And they do the same to Saul to establish dominance and humiliation in their victory. And this just shows, this is judgment against Saul, that he dies in a similar manner as Goliath. He's humiliated like Dagon. He is being judged. We learn from 1st Chronicles, chapter 10. If you read 1st Chronicles and 2nd Chronicles, they have parallel stories to 1st and 2nd Samuel and 1st and 2nd Kings. And when you look at 1st Chronicles 10, you get a little more information that they didn't just cut his head off, they took it actually to the temple of Dagon. They devoted it to their idol. Humiliating. And they spread this humiliating good news throughout the land of the Philistines.
> They put his armor in the temple of Ashtaroth and they fastened his body to the wall of Beth-shan.
So they take his armor, a military flex of power. They devote it to another false God that they worship. They take his headless body and they string it to the wall of Beth Shan for any Israelite that will come and see. They're going to see their king of 40 years, headless on the wall, humiliated. But nearby in Jabesh Gilead, they hear of what happened to their king. And if you remember the story of Jabesh Gilead, this is when the Ammonites were surrounding Jabesh and they were humiliating them. The people of Jabesh were able to get a message out. And this is one of Saul's bright moments where he, the spirit of the Lord rushes upon him and he gathers the people and the Israelites defeat the Ammonites. So the people of Jabesh, that's decades ago, but they remember it, and they're going to retrieve the desecrated body of their king.
Verse 11.
> But when the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead heard what the Philistines had done to Saul, all the valiant men arose and went all night and took the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons from the wall of Beth-shan. And they came to Jabesh and burned them there.
They Risk their lives. They go, they get his body, they get his sons, they go back to Jabesh, they burn his bodies. They burn their bodies. They then
> took their bones and buried them under the tamarisk at Jabesh, and they fasted seven days.
So even in this, at the end of the final verse of this book, where there's a bright spot here, you see that the loyalty of the people of Jabesh, as I look at this, more even in this small little bright spot of their loyalty, there's so much of God's judgment upon Saul and how all this went down that he, Saul is the king. He doesn't get a burial like a king. He doesn't even get a burial like an Israelite because the Israelites didn't do this. They didn't burn bodies. They didn't cremate. That's not what they did. That was dishonorable. And people ask the question, well, why did they go all to the trouble? They risk their lives and they go and they bring them back and they do this type of burial. And the best explanation I saw, and I think it's pretty convincing, is that they risked their lives to do this. They might have been hunted down for doing this. And they had to do the quickest way to take care of his desecrated body already to cremate, take the bones. Can I be recognized? And they buried him under a tamarisk tree, which, as I read that, I just was like that. This is more of God's judgment upon Saul. The only other time that you see a tamarisk tree mentioned in the. In the whole Bible is back in 1st Samuel 22. And that is when Saul is. He makes. He makes his judgment arrogantly against the priest of Nob under the tamarisk tree. And that's when he murders all of the priests of Nob and their wives and their children. And the same place where he made this arrogant judgment, the same type of tree. At least he's buried under this tree. So all of this shows God's judgment upon Saul and a sad ending to his life. And I think this cements the judgment against him. And if you go on and you read into 1 Chronicles and you see one of the final passages in the Bible that's going to mention Saul, you just get a blunt summary of this judgment upon him.
> So Saul died for his breach of faith. He broke faith with the Lord in that he did not keep the command of the Lord and also command consulted a medium seeking guidance.
So for not obeying the Lord's command, that's a reference to 1st Samuel 15, when he was told to kill the Amalekite king, and he doesn't. And for consulting a medium, he is appointed to die like this. And that's the end. That's the end of the story of Saul. And what I want to do is I want to just briefly go back through parts of First Samuel and. And I want to trace for us how he got here and why all of this happened. So we'll start in 1st Samuel, chapter 2. His downfall was prophetically foreshadowed in the prayer of Hannah. And I just want to read a snippet of her prayer. If you remember, Hannah, this is. She was. She loved God. She was praying for a son. She could not have a son. And then God finally hears her pray, blesses her, and her son is Samuel, the final judge from the period of the Judges, and the great seer and prophet of the land. And in this rejoicing, prayer and worshiping the Lord, she previews the whole, all the events of the next hundred years. If you go back and read Hannah's prayer, you get a picture of first and Second Samuel, what's about to happen. And in that prayer, in verse nine, it says, she says,
> He will guard the feet of his faithful ones, but the wicked shall be put to silence in darkness; for by power no one prevails. The adversaries of the LORD shall be broken to pieces; against them he will thunder in heaven. The LORD will judge the ends of the earth. And he will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed.
And it's this declaration that those who are faithful, who keep faith in the Lord, who love God, who follow him, God will give strength to them. He will guard them. But the wicked who trust in themselves will fail. You cannot trust in your own strength. Not by might shall a man prevail. And there's this declaration of God will give strength to his anointed king. And this anticipation of the kingship that is going to come. And who is this king going to be? And is he going to have this type of blessedness where God gives him strength to be the king that this nation needs? And then finally, as we followed and kept going, we began to see who's going to be the first king. And it comes from a place that no one expects, that God chooses a king from the tribe of Benjamin. We were in 1st Samuel, chapter nine. We saw that Benjamin was the lowliest of the tribes. It was the smallest of the tribes. If you go back to the Book of Judges. It has a checkered past. The people didn't think much of the tribe of Benjamin. They didn't think much of themselves. But God chooses this king that's going to lead his people from this humble tribe. So much so that when Saul is chosen from the tribe of Benjamin, he says in 9:21,
> Am I not a Benjamite, from the least of the tribes of Israel, and is not my clan the humblest of all the clans of the tribe of Benjamin? Why then have you spoken to me in this way?
Saul gets it. He's like, I'm from the tribe of Benjamin and I'm from one of the most humble clans, one of the humblest, the smallest of towns of people. Who am I that I would be king? And as you read this, if you don't know what's coming ahead, there's this hopefulness, because this is what God does. He chooses the lowly. He raises them up. And maybe that this is going to be the leader that leads the people with a type of humble leadership, that God is the one who gives the strength, that he doesn't trust in himself. But that hope quickly begins to fade. And the first evidence of his pride and self interest shows up in 1st Samuel 13. As you flip the pages, you get to the moment that he's supposed to, as the king. He's supposed to, before he goes into battle, wait on Samuel to come and make the offering, the sacrifice to the Lord. He is the king, he's not the prophet or the priest. But then he arrogantly assumes the role of prophet and priest. He offers the sacrifice, Samuel shows up. And then we see very quickly, oh, no, this is starting to go poorly. Saul thinks so highly of himself that he would step out of bounds and make this move. And that arrogance continues into 1st Samuel 15, when he is told to obey the voice of the Lord to destroy the Amalekites, that God had finally prepared judgment for them. And he doesn't. He's willing to kill all the people except The Amalekite king.
> But Saul and the people spared Agag and the best of the sheep and of the oxen and of the fattened calves and of the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them.
And when we walk through that chapter, what we saw is that he was willing to take the loot and he was willing to do what so many pagan kings in their time would do. They would keep the defeated king alive. And that would be a king that you paraded around like a slave that would exert your dominance and make your name great. His pride and self interest infected him. That he would not obey the voice of the Lord. That he would seek to make himself great. And that is when Samuel comes and declares, your kingship will end, that you will no longer be king. That God has sought a king after his own heart. And listen, in that moment Saul had the opportunity to realize his grievous sin and to say, what woe is me that I did not obey your voice. Forgive me. And then he could have said, and I submit to your decision, God. I'll do what you want. You don't want me to be king anymore, that's fine. You choose the king that you want. I'll trust you with whatever secession plan that needs to happen. He could have in that moment submitted to the will of God. But he spends every waking moment defying the will of God over and over and over again. So much so that right after that Samuel's afraid of Saul. There's a threat of violence against the great prophet. And then when it becomes clear that David is the next anointed king, he tries to kill him in 1st Samuel 18, he tries to murder him again in 1st Samuel 19. And he continues his murderous rage against David, pursuing him, pursuing him. And then he comes to 1 Samuel chapter 22, when he comes upon the town of Nob and all the priests. And then he's got it. It's so infected his soul and his mind, he thinks, oh, the priests of Nob are on the side of David. And then he arrogantly murders every priest he can, and their wives and their children. 1st Samuel 22 and Nob, the city of priests, he put to the sword both man and woman, child and infant, ox, donkey and sheep. He put to the sword that he slaughters the priesthood. And then he continues to try to kill David in first Samuel 23. And then one Samuel 24 he tries to kill him. And David spares him. And there's a moment of maybe contrition that maybe it's going. Maybe he'll stop his murderous rage. Maybe he'll stop his endless pursuit of power and self exaltation. He doesn't. This travels to First Samuel 26, where David spares him again. And by the time you get to 1st Samuel 28, he's so blind, he's so. He so doesn't know God that he consults the medium of Endor and practices the wicked and abominable practices of the four nations. Consulting help. And then it ends here. At every step he refuses. He refuses to humble himself before the Lord. He is solely concerned with himself. And it's so clear. Saul forgot where he came from. He absolutely lost himself. He forgot his origin story. He, if it wasn't for the Lord and God's sovereign choice would still be on a farm with his donkeys and Benjamin. But he forgets all of them and he gets a taste of power and he spends the rest of his days pathetically pursuing it. He's like Gollum in the end of the Lord of the Rings and Return of the King. At the very end where him and Frodo are fighting over the ring and the ring spills over the cliff into the lava below. He just desperately jumps, just for a few seconds to be able to hold it again as he falls into the flames. And that's Saul, just so, clinging to power, so infected with pride and self interest, destroying everyone he can and himself in the process. From the anointing of his head by Samuel to the beheading Paul let, or Saul let pride and self interest become his ruin.
And as Christians, when you read the story of Saul, it has to be a cautionary tale for us. It has to serve as a warning for us. Because the reality is the same prideful pitfalls that plagued Saul all of his life, that's so offered to us because it's so easy to forget where you come from. And as Christians, as we understand the Gospel, we should know that more than most. Because where we come from is humble beginnings like Saul, even more so that as Christians, we come into this world with a mountain of sin and sin debt. The Bible tells us that we're dead in sin, with a record of debt that stands against us with its legal demand. That's our humble origin story. That's where we come from. We're lowly, we're lost, we're blind, and we have no righteousness, no eternal righteousness to count to ourselves at all. We have sin and the record of sin that stands against us with no righteousness of our own but God in His grace and in his mercy and in his kindness and in his, he chooses us. He says, I'm going to redeem him. I'm going to redeem her. In spite of their sin, in spite of their brokenness, in spite of all of it, he claims us and he saves us. And then he credits to us through Christ his perfect righteousness that Jesus takes the penalty of sin and death on the cross and that through faith in him, we get all of his perfect Righteousness, all of the eternal rewards that we are brought into the eternal family of God. Romans 8 says that we're co heirs with Christ. Think about that. The eternal king. We're co heirs, we're brought into royalty. And yet when we enter into his kingdom, when we are on the palace grounds, we begin to forget where we came from. We begin to build little kingdoms for ourselves. They're like anthills, just focused on it. There's a giant kingdom that he's offered, it's so much greater, and we're so focused on our own selves. And like Saul, you get used to royalty, used to the riches that come with it. And you think more highly of yourself. We think more highly of ourselves.
> For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.
And that's what happens. We get comfortable and we get prideful. When I try to think about this, when I try to think about our church and how this shows up in our lives, there's a few ways that come to mind that I want to point out. I'm going to spend the rest of our time highlighting this because I do think that pride is something that we don't consider often enough on how it shows up. And I just want to point out for the rest of our time three prideful pitfalls that I think we should be aware of so that we don't fall into the same trap that Saul does.
The first is that we become fault finders. When we get comfortable, we start following Christ. We become fault finders. We become people who, when we hear truth, when we listen to a sermon, our first step is not to think. How is this good news for me? We begin to think and listen on behalf of other people. I said, man, I really hope that he's hearing this. I really hope that she's listening right now. We become good at finding the faults of others that when we share in our community group time, when we share in our community group time, how often does the focus of life updates become how other people in our lives have made our lives more difficult? How often when we share life updates, dare I say that our group sometimes become gossip grounds for the prosecution of every co worker and boss that's made our lives difficult. And we just get so good at looking at the fault of others instead of looking within first, realizing the sin beneath the surface that makes us so poor at responding to life. I love what Jonathan Edwards says about spiritual proud. He says the spiritually proud person is apt to find fault with other saints that they are low in grace and to be much in observing how cold and dead they are and be quick to discern and take notice of their deficiencies. But the eminently humble Christian has so much to do at home and sees so much evil in his own heart and is so concerned about it that he is not apt to be very busy with the other's hearts. That the spiritually humble Christian who understands the good news of the gospel, understands how broken we are outside of God sustaining grace in our lives, is so apt to just say, whoa, look at me, to look within. But when you follow Jesus long enough, you can fall into this trap of pride where you become an outward fault finder, so concerned with the faults of others. And I think we're blind to this. I think we're blind to this in ways that we don't even realize. Because, I mean, our church, we are not a church that says, don't drink, don't dance, and don't associate with those who do. That's so not us at all. You know why? Because we're better than that. It is. That's us. We're better than that. Not seeing the irony within that. And we may be a church that has tattoos, that maybe has wine at book clubs, but boy, how quick are we to pass judgment on a messy family that shows up or to see someone's unruly kids and start to. Maybe I'm alone in that, but I feel that. I feel that all of a sudden someone shows up and their kids all over the place, and I'm like, I mean, do you want me to take them out or you. It's just our go to move. It's just outwardly focused. Someone comes in and starts quoting from some weak, mega, churchy Instagram ministry person, and it's just like, oh, just wait till I tell you about desiring God. It's just like. I don't know, maybe it's just confession time for me. I don't think I'm alone in this. I don't think. I don't. I think because what happens is we so will distance ourselves from some of those other churches, that you'll distance yourself from whatever stale Baptist church you grew up in. And you'll be so blind to the spiritual pride that infects your soul. We need to consider this. It's more subtle, but it's just as lethal.
Second way, we become thankless. We become thankless. We'll complain about status, about income, about our situations, about our lot in life. We'll complain inwardly and outwardly and will fall into the mindset that says, listen, I do the right things. I'm a decent person. I come on Sundays, I'm faithful. In going to group, I tithe. And that hurts because groceries are like gold. I do it, y'. All. Some of you are like, they spin the register around at every single establishment now and say, your turn to tip. Even when all they did was they turn around and grab the thing which resembles nothing of waiting tables. And I push the button. I'm a good, decent person who does all the right things. You have this record of all the things that you're doing so well at. And inwardly you're like, but why, God, have you not done this in my life? Why is it so hard? Why have you not blessed me with this? Why have you not given me this person? And what happens is you begin to measure the goodness of God by the things that he does for us in a way that grows a thanklessness that's rooted in pride and self interest. And it's a dangerous game to play because Saul could have done the same thing. He could have said, lord, look at the stuff I saved the people of Jabesh Gilead. Look at the good works that I've done. He could have pointed those things. But the problem wasn't the things. It was that he didn't know God. He didn't know him. And he was so self interested. And he clung to power and he did not cling to Christ. We did not cling to God. And he became entitled to his place on the throne. And it led into judgment. And we can do the same thing. We can become an entitled people. We can have an inward posture that says, God, I'm doing the things. Why have you not responded? I'm doing the things. Why have you made this difficult? I'm doing the things. Why have you not blessed me with the things that are so good? And we can turn and say, here are all the things that I've done and not realize that that comes from the same heart that one day may stand before the Lord and the Lord may say to you, depart from me, I never knew you. Because it's not about the things. It's about knowing and beholding him as more glorious than any way that you might be blessed in this life. Thanklessness flows from an entitled position of pride, and it places the interest of self above God. We become more concerned and we listen, if you fall into this, you will measure the goodness of God by the things that he does for you. And not because he is good. And that is a dangerous place. And it is rooted often in pride and self interest. And it is something we should consider.
Lastly, we become dependent upon the pride of life.
> Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world.
Saul got used to the royalty and the riches that came with it, and he spent all of his days trying to defend his position. And it's when our eyes meet, the pride of life, all of the material blessings that he can give us in this world. And that's a dangerous place to be. It's a dangerous place to have our primary energy be focused on gaining the comforts of this present world. Because what you will do is you will take the creative things that he has given us and you'll elevate it above the Creator. It's what we do. And many of us, we live comfortable lives. Many of us live like kings in comparison to the rest of history. And it's like, you don't know me. I don't have to know you. You live in this country, and if you eat three meals a day, you have it better than the majority of people in history. We live like kings. And what happens when you live like kings and you live like queens is you start to. You start to feel entitled to the things that come with that. And basic needs are confused with wants. So much so that it's a need to have Internet, it's a need to have a smartphone, It's a need to have all these things that when we don't have it, we don't feel okay. It's a need to level up to the next thing and the next thing and the next thing. And if we'll think critically about our own soul, we'll realize that there's a pride and self interest within that posture. And the pride of life is a really dangerous thing.
We should consider all of these ways because these are the things that took Saul down. And these are the ways that we will forget where we came from, that we will be so blinded by pride, we will forget that we came from the pit of sin, that we came from a place of deceitfulness of our own heart. We came with the most malice of thoughts. We came from wayward wickedness. And we still would be there had God and his grace and his Mercy not chosen to redeem us. So as Christians, we must take this seriously. We must self examine and we must run to him in repentance. Others of you, this is you may be in a different spot. Others of you, you've never actually known God in the first place. You've never actually surrendered to the Lord in the first place. You haven't done this for a variety of reasons. You think that possibly that you know what's better for you. You don't want the Scriptures and the Bible and faith to impose limits on your life, that you want to live your life and your terms. And I want to tell you something. Saul began to make very similar choices to preserve the best future for him. And it ends in the same spot. And that's judgment. And I want you to see that ultimately choosing all the things that you think is best for you not only does not go well for you in this life, not only is not good for your soul in this life, that is not good for you in eternity. So whether that's you or whether you're a Christian, that's like me, blind to his own pride. The hope is still the same.
> But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble." Submit yourselves therefore to God.
God, our God, is a God of grace. Looking at men and women that build their lives around them. He says, I'm still here and I have grace for you. If you'll but humble yourself before me in faith, if you'll but humble yourself before me in repentance, you'll see that I'm better. You'll experience my grace and I will cleanse you of the pride that seeks to destroy him. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us consider your word. I pray that you help us consider the story of First Samuel and the warnings that are bound up in it. But God, I pray that you would help us consider the hope that you have for sinners like me and God. I pray that you would begin to work in our hearts in a way that would behold you above all created things, including ourselves. In Jesus name, Amen.
We're going to prepare to take the Lord's Supper. I want to read From Mark, Chapter 14 before we take the Lord's Supper.
> And as they were eating, he took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to them and said, "Take; this is my body." And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. And he said to them, "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many. Truly, I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God."
That when we come to the table, we are reminded the prideful people. Jesus loved the prideful people. Jesus died for that. He went to the cross to die for broken prideful people who at times will forget where they came from, who at times will be blinded by their own self interest. And as a Christian, you get to joyfully come to the table with your church family and remember the goodness of the Gospel for prideful sinners. Not in shame, but in joy, because he gives more grace. When you are ready, come to the table. There's gluten free in that corner up there. And there's things gluten free in the balcony as well. But if you are not a Christian, if you're not a Christian, please do not take part in this at all. This is a ritual you will not understand. My hope for you right now is that you take part in Christ. You'd sit in your seat and you'd pray and you do what our God commands you to do. To humble yourself and to listen and to respond in faith. But respond as the Lord leads you.
1 Samuel 29-30
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. Grab a Bible and head to First Samuel, chapter 29. We're gonna be in chapter 29 and 30 today. We are working our way through the book of First Samuel. And what we've been seeing in the story is that the story has followed David until he worked himself into a corner. And right at the moment, you were like, what's gonna happen? Then it was like, hey, let's talk about Saul. And then it worked Saul into an even worse corner, and you were like, what's gonna happen with Saul? And then now it's going, hey, let's go talk about David. It's going. It's going back. That's where we are today.
So what happened was David went to the Philistines. He decided that the best thing for him to do was to go live among the Philistines, that Saul was eventually going to kill him. So he goes and lives among the Philistines, and he begins to attack and raid towns and cities around him. And then going back to Achish, the King of Gath, and saying, here's who I attacked. And he lies to him. He says, I've been attacking the Israelites. I've been attacking Judah. I've been attacking the Kenites, who are friends of Judah and live in that area. And so that's what he's been doing. And then the last thing we saw was Achish said, well, hey, good news. We're going to go kill some more Israelites. All of us are going, and you get to go, too. And David said, well, you're going to find out what I can do. And what does that mean? Find out that you actually will kill Israelites? Find out, are you going to hurt Achish? Like, what's going to happen? It's a little bit like you've been lying and telling people that Adam Sandler is a family friend of yours. And now he's coming to the Colonial Life arena, and they want you to help him get tickets. That's kind of the situation we're in. We're trying to figure out what is David going to do, what's going to happen? And then it stops. Says, let's talk about Saul.
So the Philistines have marched in. Saul is trying to figure out what he's going to do, and God is no longer talking to him because Saul has been rejected as king and no longer has the privileges, the right to seek the Lord and has not ever really seemed like he knows the Lord. And so in his desire to hear what he ought to do, he goes to a medium, a witch, someone's going to speak to the dead on his behalf. They summon Samuel, which she seems really surprised. Works. Samuel shows up and says, you're going to war tomorrow and you're going to die and the kingdom's been taken from you. And then it now we're headed back over to David. So we were watching is this slow motion train wreck where Dave, David is now marching in with the Philistines to go fight against Saul, who's going to die and what is going to happen and what is going to play out. And as we're reading this today, we're going to see that something very bad happens. And you might be like, yeah, we thought that was going to happen, but something very bad happens to David and it's not what we think is coming. But as we read this story today, we're going to see how David responds to this absolute tragedy and hopefully gain some wisdom in how we ought to respond in situations where the bottom falls out for us. So that's the hope. This morning we're gonna pray and then we're gonna step into the text.
Father, we ask for your spirit to be at work, to guide us, to help us to hear your word, to help us to hear your voice and to follow you. We ask this in Jesus name. Amen.
> Now the Philistines had gathered all their armies at Aphek; and the Israelites were encamped by the spring that is in Jezreel.
> And the lords of the Philistines were passing on by hundreds and by thousands, and David and his men were passing on in the rear with Achish.
> And the commanders of the Philistines said, "What are these Hebrews doing here?"
> And Achish said to the commanders of the Philistines, "Is this not David, the servant of Saul, the king of Israel, who has been with me these days or these years, and I have found nothing in him from the day he deserted to me to this day?"
> But the commanders of the Philistines were displeased at him, and the commanders of the Philistines said to him, "Send the man away, that he may return to the place from which you have assigned him. Let him not go down with us to battle, lest in the battle he become an adversary to us. For how could this fellow reconcile himself to his lord? Would it not be with the heads of the men here?"
> Is not this David, of whom they kept singing to one another in dances, 'Saul has struck down his thousands, and David his ten thousands'?
> Then Achish called David and said to him, "As the LORD lives, you have been upright, and it seems to me that you should go out and go in with me in the campaign." And David said to Achish, "Very well, then you shall know what your servant can do."
> And Achish said to David, "I know that you are good in my sight, as an angel of God. Nevertheless the lords of the Philistines have said, 'He shall not go up with us to battle.'
> Now therefore rise early in the morning with the servants of your lord who came with you, and as soon as you have light be on your way." So David and his men rose up in the morning to depart in the first light and to return to the land of the Philistines; and the Philistines went up to Jezreel.
So they're passing on, everybody's getting ready, we're going to war. And all of a sudden the other commanders start going, whoa, who's bringing Hebrews to fight Hebrews? And why are they stupid? We've done this before. The last time we saw this is when Jonathan went up and fought against the Philistines. And it said that the Hebrews that were with the Philistines turned on them and started fighting against them. So they're like, hey, we learned this lesson. We don't want Hebrews to go fight Hebrews. So who's bringing them? Why are they here? And then it says this, Achish says this, it says, what are these Hebrew doing here? And Achish said to the commanders of the Philistines, is this not David, the servant of Saul, king of Israel? Which is just the worst way to start, because that's who they're going to fight. He's trying to work his way out. Have you ever done this? You're trying to work your way out of a situation and you just start the wrong sentence and you're like, wait, wait, wait, let me finish. I started this wrong. But that's what it seems like, because he's like. They're like, who are these Hebrews? He's like, oh, Saul's servant, you guys. And, you know, they gotta be looking at him like, what are you talking about? Okay. He keeps going. He says, this is not David, servant of Saul, king of Israel, who has been with me now for days and years, and since he deserted to me, I have found no fault in him to this day. So what he's saying is, yeah, this guy's against Saul. He used to be his servant, but now he's with us. So this is going to go great.
But the commanders of the Philistines were angry with him, and the commanders of the Philistines said to him, send the man back, that he may return to the place to which you have assigned him. He shall not go down with us to battle, lest in the battle he become an adversary to us. So he says. They say, no, no, no, no, no. You might like him. We don't know him. That sounds terrible. Send him back. Otherwise we might get in the middle of the fight and he might start fighting us. Then they say, for how could this fellow reconcile himself to his Lord? Would it not be with the heads of the men here? Like, wouldn't be like a good way for him to get back in good with Saul, for him to just start killing us? Haven't we seen this guy raise one of the heads of a Philistine above him before? Haven't we. We've lived this out, right? We remember what he did with Goliath. Don't you think that'd be a good way for him to get back in his good graces? That's what they're arguing, and then they say, is not this David of whom they sing to one another in dances, Saul has struck down his thousands and David his ten thousands, which I just. I love this song that has just made its way through this whole book. It was a problem when it first started. Saul was mad about it. This is the second time Philistines have quoted it. This song is such a hit. It's international. It's not just a hit in Israel. They know it. It's like, who let the dogs out? Everyone knows it's not good, but for some reason it just has run across the globe and it's stuck in your head. And there were Philistines, like, bouncing around their house doing yard work, and they hear themselves going, and David is 10th. Come on. That's what happens. So they're like, we know this. This is the guy they have a song about. Absolutely not.
Then Achish called David and said to him, as the Lord lives, you have been honest, and to me it seems right that you should march out and end with me in the campaign. No, he hasn't. Achish is wrong. So he says, look, David, you've been great, and you've been killing all these Israelites. And David's like, mm. He says, so I think you should come, for I have found nothing wrong in you from the day of your coming to me to this day. Nevertheless, the lords do not approve of you, so go back now and go peaceably that you may not displease the lords of the Philistines. So he calls him over and says, hey, man, look, I think you're great, but they don't like you. And we just had a whole meeting where they were real mean to me about it. And I know that you would never lie to me and trick me and that you're totally on our team, but they don't know that. And so you're going to have to leave.
And then David said, David said to Achish, but what have I done? What have you found in your servant from the day I entered your service until now, that I may not go and fight against the enemies of my lord the king? So David says, this is an outrage. What do they think? Like, that I've secretly not been killing Israelites and I've been killing other people and that I might turn on you in this battle. Is that what they think? And he's like, yeah, I know, it's crazy, right? And David's like, yeah, this is really unfair. David says that I can't fight against the enemies of my lord the King. It's still unclear to us in this text whether or not he actually means a kish or whether or not he means Saul. David is very tactical in his approach to all of this. He seems outraged, but he's going to leave. And Achish answered David and said, I know that you are blameless in my sight as an angel of God. Nevertheless, the commanders of the Philistines have said, he shall not go up with us to the battle. Now then, rise early in the morning with the servants of your Lord who came with you, and start early in the morning and depart as soon as you have light.
So David set out with his men early in the morning to return to the land of the Philistines. But the Philistines went up to Jezreel. Okay, so a couple of things happened in this text. First of all, we are, I think, intended to see some of the humor of this situation. And I do believe that the Philistine lords are right and that Akish is wrong, but we're not actually going to ever find out what David fully intended to do. But David's leaving. So this slow moving crash that we've been watching is not going to have David in it. And in some ways we see that the Lord is guiding this kind of behind the scenes. Doesn't really tell us that, but it just seems like the Lord's helping David out. But also some of what the text is doing is for all of time and all the readers forever to say, when Saul fought the Philistines and died, David was not there. He had been with the Philistines. He was not there. They sent him home. That's some of the work that this passage is doing is. It's just helping, you know, helping everybody know. It's not skipping this information. David wasn't there.
But I said, david's going to face a tragedy, and it's not what we thought. So we're about to find out what, what has happened, what, what is, what's going on.
> Now when David and his men came to Ziklag on the third day, the Amalekites had made a raid against the Negeb and against Ziklag and had struck Ziklag and burned it with fire,
> and had taken the women and those who were in it captive, both small and great; they killed no one, but carried them off and went on their way.
> So David and his men came to the city and found it burned with fire, and their wives and their sons and their daughters taken captive.
> Then David and the people who were with him raised their voices and wept until they had no more power to weep.
> David's two wives also had been taken captive, Ahinoam of Jezreel, and Abigail, the widow of Nabal of Carmel.
> And David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because all the people were bitter in soul, each for his sons and daughters. But David strengthened himself in the LORD his God.
> Then David said to Abiathar the priest, the son of Ahimelech, "Bring me the ephod." And Abiathar brought the ephod to David.
> And David inquired of the LORD, "Shall I pursue after this raiding party? Shall I overtake them?" He answered him, "Pursue, for you shall surely overtake and rescue."
> So David set out, he and the six hundred men who were with him, and they came to the brook Besor, where those who were left behind stayed.
> But David pursued, he and four hundred men, for two hundred remained behind, who were so weak that they could not cross the brook Besor.
> They found an Egyptian in the open country, and they brought him to David, and gave him bread and he ate; and they gave him water to drink,
> and they gave him a piece of a cake of figs and two bunches of raisins. And when he had eaten his spirit revived, for he had not eaten bread or drunk water for three days and three nights.
> And David said to him, "To whom do you belong, and where do you come from?" He said, "I am a young man of Egypt, servant to an Amalekite; and my master left me behind because I fell sick three days ago.
> We made a raid on the Negeb of the Cherethites and on the Negeb of Judah and on the Negeb of Caleb, and we burned Ziklag with fire."
> And David said to him, "Can you take me down to this raiding party?" And he said, "Swear to me by God that you will not kill me or deliver me into the hands of my master, and I will take you down to this raiding party."
> And he took him down and behold, they were spread out over the land, eating and drinking and dancing because of all the great spoil that they had taken from the land of the Philistines and from the land of Judah.
> And David struck them from the twilight until the evening of the next day, and not a man of them escaped except four hundred young men who rode on camels and fled.
> And David recovered all that the Amalekites had taken, and David rescued his two wives.
> Nothing was lacking to them, either small or great, sons or daughters, spoil or anything that had been taken; David brought them all back.
> And David took all the flocks and the herds, and drove them before those who were with him, and they drove on before him as far as Aroer.
> And when David came to the two hundred men who were so weak that they could not follow him, they came out to meet him to meet the men who had come with him. And David came near to the people and greeted them.
> But all the wicked men and worthless fellows among the men who went with David said, "Because they did not go with us, we will not share with them any of the spoil that we have recovered, except that each man may take his wife and his children, and be gone."
> Then David said, "You shall not do so, my brothers, with what the LORD has given us, who has preserved us and delivered into our hand the band that came against us.
> For who will listen to you in this matter? But as his share is who goes down into the battle, so shall his share be who stays by the baggage; they shall share alike."
> And he made it a statute and an ordinance for Israel from that day onward to this day.
> Then David came to Ziklag, and sent some of the spoil to the elders of Judah, to his friends, saying, "Behold a present for you from the spoil of the enemies of the LORD:
> to those in Bethel, and to those in Ramoth of the Negeb, to those in Jattir,
> to those in Aroer, to the people in Siphmoth, to those in Eshtemoa,
> to those in Rachal, to those in the cities of the Jerahmeelites, to those in the cities of the Kenaites,
> to those in Hormah, to those in Bor-ashan, to those in Athach, and to those in Hebron,
> to all the places where David and his men had wandered."
So when they came back on the third day, the Amalekites had attacked and had burned Ziklag and taken their wives and children. When David and his men came to the city, they found it burned with fire, and their wives and their sons and daughters taken captive. They raised their voices and wept until they had no more strength to weep.
First response is just brokenness, lament, weeping, raising their voices until they're spent. David's two wives also had been taken captive. Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail, the widow of Nabal of Carmel. And David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him because all the people were bitter in soul. Each for his sons and daughters. So there's this moment where they start just saying, well, let's just kill David. They're bitter in soul. They don't really have a good plan. They don't really know what to do, but they just say, well, let's just kill David. If this is what it's like to follow him, let's be done with that.
And there is this moment, and you can see it, where there's something very real about men who spend their lives defending and protecting and caring for their wives and children. And when that's not there, what am I doing and what do we do next? And it says, but David strengthened himself in the Lord, his God. And David said to Abiathar, we're see, somehow he does that. Abiathar, the priest, the son of Ahimelech, bring me the ephod. So Abiathar brought the ephod to David. Now, this is the first time we've seen him do this since chapter 26. The last time we saw David make a big decision, it said he just reasoned it in his heart and did something. And now he's saying, bring me the ephod. And this is good. We've been wanting to see this, but David, in this moment of utter despair, absolutely bottomed out. He turns to the Lord.
And David inquired of the Lord, shall I pursue after this band? Shall I overtake them? And he answered him, pursue, for you shall surely overtake and shall surely rescue. Can you imagine the moment that David hears that? He says, should we chase after him? And God says, go, because it'll work. And you know, David had to go strap his belt on. He said, we're going to. The Lord said, it's going to work. Let's go. We're going to catch them. Let's go. And they would have left some sort of sign. A whole group coming in and a whole group going out is going to leave some sign. Now there's a chance that they could lose it or they could split up, but they've got something to go on and they begin to head in that direction, tracking after this group that's burned their city and taken their families. And if there's a group of focused men, it's right here.
David set out and the 600 men who were with him and they came to the brook Besor, where those who were left behind stayed. But David pursued. He and 400 men, 200 stayed behind who were too exhausted to cross the brook Besor. So they've traveled up, traveled back, wept themselves dry, and then said, let's go to war. They get to a place that's going to be difficult to travel over, difficult to get baggage across, and 200 of them just can't keep going. I don't know if you've ever been working and working and working or running and running and running and laboring and doing these sort of things, and then you stop for just a bit, drink some water, catch your breath, and suddenly your body doesn't work anymore. And if you hadn't stopped, you might could have kept going. But now it's not functioning. That seems what some of these guys happen, they just, they sit down and they're crazy, cramping up legs. They're just like, I can't keep going. But 400 keep going.
They found an Egyptian in the open country and brought him to David. So as they're traveling along, as they're tracking, they find an Egyptian. And it seems like they have some people out in different areas trying to scout and figure out which way to go. They find this guy, they bring him to David and they gave him bread and he ate. They gave him water to drink. They gave him a piece of a cake of figs and two clusters of raisins. And when he had eaten, his spirit revived. Okay, so he was having a spirit problem, for he had not eaten bread or drunk water for three days and three nights. He was sick. So he was doing poorly before he got left there, but he's been there. So they find a guy who's almost dead and they're just pumping him full of stuff till he can talk. David said to him, to whom do you belong and where are you from? He said, I am a young man of Egypt, servant to an Amalekite. My master left me behind because I fell sick three days ago. We had made a raid against the Negeb of the Cherethites, which is most likely the way that they refer to the Philistines, and against that which belongs to Judah and against the Negeb of Caleb. And we burned Ziklag with fire.
And David said to him, will you take me down to this band? So they found a guy who was with them and they said, tell us where they're going. He said, swear to me by God that you will not kill me or deliver me into the hands of my master and I will take you down to this band. So he's all hyped up on raisins and figs, and now he's negotiating and he says, yes, I'll take you if you don't kill me, which is a real good chance that they might and don't return me to their master. Well, they're not showing up and giving presents to the Amalekites. So that one, I don't think they were in really any danger of happening. He doesn't seem to know who he's talking to. But these people really want to find them. And they seem to agree to some terms because he makes a statement. And then it just goes to verse 16.
And when he had taken him down behold they were spread abroad over all the land eating and drinking and dancing because of all the great spoil that they had taken from the land of the Philistines and from the land of Judah. So they find this group that has suddenly just started taking over this whole section. Partying. And if we weren't upset with them enough, this party has eating. And as Baptists were like, okay, but then drinking and dancing. They gotta die, y'. All. They are celebrating with the spoils that they have this massive celebration spread out across the land. And it says they see them, they've caught them, and here's what happens.
And David struck them down from twilight until the evening of the next day. And not a man of them escaped except for 400 young men who mounted camels and fled. So interesting. This takes a long time. They are just fighting for a long time. At least twilight sometimes can refer to morning twilight, even though we don't use it that way. And evening of the next day, their day started at 6pm so it is possible that what it is saying is the shortest amount of time was one whole day, but it could have been a night and a day or a day and another night, but at least the whole day of working their way through and fighting and differing amounts of, you know, if there's a party going on down there and people start yelling and it sounds like there's a fight, you might. Wouldn't catch you exactly what was happening until it was happening. And it says not a man was left except for 400 of them that got away on camels. Which tells us a couple of things.
One, I just appreciate the way that's worded. Everyone was dead and someone was like, what about those 400, except for the 400 guys on camels? Which makes you think that camels are like the motorcycle of that day. You know, my wife and I watch cop shows and police officers will thank people on motorcycles. They'll be like, thank you for pulling over like that. They'll chase you in a car. Motorcycles are just like. That's what camels are like. They're like, pull. They're on camels. Ain't nobody catching them. But it also tells you that there was a massive amount of people because David shows up with 400 and it says they killed everybody except for 400. Meaning that the amount of Amalekites here, they were way outnumbered, but they win.
And David recovered all that the Amalekites had taken and David rescued his two wives. Nothing was missing. Whether small or great, sons or daughters, spoil or anything that had been taken. David brought back all. David also captured all the flocks and herds and the people drove the livestock before him and said, this is David's spoil. And then David came to the 200 men who had been too exhausted to follow David and who had been left at the brook Besor. So they drove the cattle in front of them. So these guys are exhausted. It's been another, at least day, two days, three days. They're regaining their strength and they're waiting, not really knowing what to do now. And then flocks and herds start showing up. At first you're thinking maybe somebody. And then it's like there's too many of them. And you're like, this is a good sign. And then their families show up. And you know, there's got to be people looking for everybody. And there's moments where you don't know, are they here? Are they here? And guess what, y'? All, it says that they're all there. There wasn't a single husband, father that went out and didn't get that moment of wrapping his arms back around and retrieving what was left lost.
And when they went out to meet David and to meet the people who were with them, and when David came near to the people, he greeted them then all the wicked and worthless fellows among the men who had gone with David said, because they did not go with us, we will not give them any of the spoil that has been, that we have recovered, except that each man may lead away his wife and children and depart. So some of them say, well, they sat here hanging out by a creek, like, they don't. They can have their kids back, but that's it. But David said, you shall not do so, my brothers, with what the Lord has given us, he has preserved us and given into our hand the band that came against us. Who. Who would listen to you in this matter? For as his share is who goes down into the battle, so shall his share be who stays by the baggage, they shall share alike. And he made it a statute and a rule for Israel from that day forward to this day.
So some of what it's helping us see is like, why that's a rule for them. But it's also, this isn't the main thing we're going to talk about today. But I can't help but point this out. In this, I see a beautiful picture of what Jesus is like. When they're marching all the spoil back. They announce, this is David's spoil, that it was all his and at his discretion. And then worthless fellows get in the middle of it, and he immediately calls them brother. He says, you won't do that, brother. And then it goes to everybody. Everybody's blessed and it's like that's what Jesus does. He's a good, wise king who restores what is lost and brings it all back. That through the work of Christ in the middle of our sin, our sin doesn't win. And he ultimately restores everything the way it was meant to be. He's ultimately eternally going to fix it. And he makes worthless people his brothers. And everybody is brought in and shared with, even the ones who couldn't accomplish anything on their own. So I sorry I can't read that and not tell you how amazing Jesus is.
When David came to Ziklag, he sent part of the spoil to his friends, the elders of Judah, saying, here is a present for you from the spoil of the enemies of the Lord. So he's sending gifts. It was for those in Bethel and Ramoth, of the Negeb, in Jatir, in Aroer, in Sifmoth, in Eshtemoah, in Rachal, in the cities of the Jerahomeliites, in the cities of the Kenites. I got that one in Horma, in Borshan, in Ak, in Hebron, for all the places where David and his men had roamed. So he sends out, he has all this spoil that they got, and he sends it back and out to all the people where he's been wandering around. And he doesn't send any to the zip. It's because they told on him multiple times. But he sends it to the other people near where he had been, and he gives them gifts and says, this is from the enemies of the Lord, and he blesses all of them.
I want to go back in the story to the moment where they find out that their families are gone and their city is burned. Because I want us to take a moment to investigate what does it look like to come out of those kind of moments. And I think David gives us a good example. So I just want to go back to verse four, it says they wept. And then in verse six, it says, and David was greatly distressed for the people spoke of stoning him because all the people were bitter soul, each for his sons and daughters. Okay. I think it is helpful for us to realize that we are perfectly capable of that type of decision making. Is stoning David going to fix anything? No. Will it make the situation worse? Yes. Is David the one who's actually going to lead them out of this problem? Yes. But they're starting to think maybe we should just kill David. And they probably have some reasons, but their reasoning is not good.
And one of the things that we need to know is perfectly within our grasp in these type of situations is for us to have an overwhelming desire to do something, to react, to respond, got to do something. And quite often the thing we pick is unwise, harmful. Quite often the ideas that we come up with are not good ideas. This is one of the reasons why we're blessed to have church family around us. So that when we announce, I'm going to do this, sometimes it's like, no, don't, don't do that. And you're really annoyed by them saying that, don't tell me what to do. It's like, but I don't want to. But, no, don't do that. Telling you what not to do is different. This is, we'll choose people, start making big life decisions, change their job, move locations, run to whatever makes them feel safe, run to whatever makes them forget. This is how we get run. We run to substances, we run to sin, we run to anger, sexual sin. This is how we get hermits and hoarders. Like, this is the stuff where we respond to something and we just got to make a decision that is perfectly within our ability to do that.
But David takes a different track. It says, but David strengthened himself in the Lord his God. So David turns to the Lord in this moment. He does. He has nowhere else to turn. He turns to the Lord, which is the place to turn. And one of the things I think we need to realize is that if you've never turned to the Lord ever, when something really bad happens, then you should. But as Christians, we want to be very practiced in this so that when everything falls apart, this is the only thing we know how to do. This is one of the reasons why people who do like fighting sports and those sort of things, they practice over and over and over and over again so that when they get their bell rung and they're not thinking clearly, they can keep moving and doing what they're. And that's some of what we need to be. You need to be in the Word on a regular basis. You need to. So that when these kind of moments happen in life that you go, I don't know what else to do, but I'm going to read, I'm going to pray. I'm going to get around church, family. You're going to call people and say, y' all need to come read, you need to come pray, you need to come. I don't have the strength for this right now. I need somebody to read this to me. I need someone to talk this out with me. I need somebody when I say some idea that doesn't make any sense. I need some people here who are going to help point me back to Jesus.
But that's what he does. He turns to the Lord, and we're going to see what he does, specifically, how he strengthens himself. David said to Abiathar, the priest, the son of Ahimelech, bring me the Ephod. So Abiathar brought the ephod to David. And David inquired of the Lord, shall I pursue this band? What David seeks is a word from the Lord, some clarity from the Lord, some direction from the Lord, and he goes to the place that he has access to it, which is in the Ephod, but we have access to it in the Scriptures, so that we get to be people who read our Bibles. And in these moments, read more, not less. There are times where as pastors, we'll say, you need to go home and you need to open the New Testament, you need to go to Ephesians, you need to go to Romans, and you need to start reading. And I know that sometimes it's like I don't have the energy for that. It's like, you don't have the energy to not do that. It's like I'm dying in a desert. And we're like, you need to drink water. And you're like, I don't know if I can. It's like, no, you've got to. We get to and have to. We must come to the Word and say, lord, I need your help. I need your wisdom. I need your clarity. And lean into the Word the way that David does. He seeks a word from the Lord.
I think sometimes when we say that, when we say, anytime, we say, you need to read your Bible. It's like, okay, good, but I really want something to do. I really want something actual. And what we mean is something along the lines of stoning David. I want something I can do. I get it. Read my Bible. Then what? And it's like, but you're missing it if that's the way you think about it. When Jesus teaches a sermon on the mount, he ends with, if you'll hear my words and do them, you'll be like a wise man who built his house on a rock. The rains came and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. So if you hear my words and you don't do them, then you'll be like a fool who built his house on sand. And the rains came and the floods came and the winds blew and beat against that house and the house fell. And great was the fall of it. The storm hits both houses, the winds beat both houses, but one of them has a foundation, has something to hold on to, has something it's built into. It'd be like if you hired a contractor. And I said, how's the house development going? You're like, they're wasting a lot of time on that foundation. We could have a three story house by now. And it's like, with no foundation. What are you talking about? Like, you need the foundation. You need. We have to have that. You need direction before you move.
In the Pirates of the Caribbean movies where Johnny Depp's Jack Sparrow and he's doing all this all the time, he's got a compass. And we find out in one of the later movies that that compass isn't a real compass. It doesn't point north. It points towards what Jack most wants. And so many of us, that's the compass we're running around with. It just points towards what we want. And so we're going, I'm looking at my compass and it says, go this way. And it's like, that compass is not a compass. At one point they're out in the ocean and it's pointing at a girl who's on the boat. That's the compass we run around with. So often it's just pointing at something that's moving around that changes from day to day. Do you know how often your moods change, your desires change, how often your wisdom falters and fails? And how many times you've said, if I could just have this, I'd be happy. If I could just have that, I. I'd be happy. And how often your Compass has been bouncing around, and we need one that points to the same place all the time. And if you're in a storm in the middle of the ocean, you don't have any landmarks. So when the clouds begin to clear and you get to set a course, you don't know where you are. And if you have a compass that points nowhere, you don't know where to go. So we need to be people of the Word who know how to move. And that's what happens. David seeks the Lord and it says this. He says, shall I pursue? Shall I overtake? He answered them, pursue, for you shall surely overtake and shall surely rescue. So David set out.
Now, if that had said anything else, we would be furious. If it said, you shall pursue, that's a command. You shall surely overtake. You shall surely rescue. And then it said, so David sat down. So David cried more, louder. He'd be like, what is what go? Because we would be reading the text and saying, you have a promise, you have a command, you have something to stand on, you have something to hold on to. You have something that will help drive you forward. You have something solid. And so often we're in the middle of these situations and I want you to know that the Bible has something solid that we can hold onto. It's got some truth, some promises that have been made to us, some realities that are ours. When Jesus commissions the church, he says, I will be with you always to the end of the age. That there's never a time where he leaves us or forsakes us. And in these moments we can know that, Lord, you've promised to be with me, so be with me. But I'm going to act. I'm going to move as if you're here and you're helping. I'm going to trust your spirit to indwell me. He says that the spirit not to grieve the Holy Spirit who sealed us from the day of redemption. Meaning that if I belong to Jesus, if I trust him, his spirit is in me and I am kept. He tells his disciples, my disciples know my voice. They hear my voice and they follow. My sheep hear my voice and follow me. And he says, and no one will snatch them out of my hand so that you can in these moments go, Lord, I know that you're going to keep me. I know that you're going to hold me, and I need you to that we have promises that we can lean into because what you believe matters. You act out of what you believe. So we have to be people who know what is true, know what is real, know the promises of God and hold onto them. And also know that he holds on to us so that we won't be lost in these situations when we don't know what to do.
I want to read Romans 8 because I just want you to see one of these promises. Romans 8 begins by saying there's no condemnation for those who are in Christ.
> There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
>
> Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?
>
> As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered."
>
> No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
>
> For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers,
>
> nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
That when you're going, everything is falling apart. Well, there's a promise that you won't be separated from his love, that he'll be with you, that he'll keep you, that he'll get you to the end, that he can't be conquered by circumstance. There's some things that help ground us and hold us so that we might move forward in faith and in hope. He says no. In all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I'm sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation. He covers that. Because if you were like, well, what about this? He said, all of it will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord, that if you belong to Jesus, you belong to Jesus and you are his and he will keep you and he will hold you, and you will be able to stand in the middle of these things and you get to run to His Word and say, Lord, I need this more than I need anything else. And then you can move forward with practical steps. But you've got to do this first.
Let's pray.
Lord, we pray that we would be people who in the depths of our despair, because the storm is coming. It hits every house, it hits every life. There's moments where we all have ziklag or smoke rises. Lord, we pray that we would be people who would cling to the promises, that would know your word and would trust you. You. Because a promise is as good as the one who makes it. And you have died for us. You have risen, you have resurrected, you have hope that is ours in you. You are the king of all things. So may we be a people of the word, who seek you in the midst of our despair. Who love one another well in the midst of our despair. And who cling to the hope that's in Christ. Because there's nothing else to cling to. In Jesus name, Amen.
The band's gonna come. We're gonna sing. One of the reasons we sing on Sundays is to worship the Lord. But also to help truth go from our heads to our hearts. And to rehearse for ourselves what is real. And so we're gonna sing together, reminding ourselves and each other of how good the Lord is and the hope that we have.
1 Samuel 28
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
My name is Spencer. I'm one of the pastors here. We're continuing to walk through the book of First Samuel. We are now in chapter 28. We'll be there today. So one of the things that my kids are very aware of is that I made a lot of mistakes growing up. And it's not an uncommon thing for them to ask about a specific thing. Hey, did you do this when you were a kid? And I say, I mean, I don't want to lie in that moment. If I can dodge, I'll do that. I'm very good at changing the subject. But they're getting older and they're getting a little bit smarter, and they're like, no, no, no, no, no. Just stay on point. Did you used to do this as a kid? And what I typically say is, like, yes, I did. And they know at this point that I made a lot of mistakes. You know, I tell them, like, I came to Faith later when I was 17. I didn't love Jesus wholeheartedly. I try to explain that. What I want you to understand is that when you choose this, more bad decisions can come out of that. So it becomes kind of a living cautionary tale. But I try to be discreet. I don't try to share all the things, but that's getting difficult because I have family. And I don't know if it's like a rite of passage for grandparents and aunts and uncles just to volunteer information to your children, but that's a thing. Because the other day they asked very commonly about a thing. Did you used to do this? And we had the whole little thing, yes, you know, I did, but da, da, da, da, like I used to. But, you know, this is a cautionary tale. Don't fall in the same mistakes. Because, you know, I was kind of a bad kid that did bad things at times. And they said, oh, yeah, we know that because he used to throw rocks at cars. And I said, what? How do you know that? I used to throw rocks at carts. And someone in the family had just volunteered the fact that when we were little rebellious children out at the roadside in the woods having fun throwing rocks at cars and, you know, just to see if they would look up in the sky and wonder where it came from. And I was like, yeah, that is a thing I used to do. And I had to do the whole thing. But I'm realizing as I get older that this is going to be a thing, that just some aunt or uncle is just going to volunteer some information, and I'm gonna have to really solidify this point that, yes, I did those things. And if you continue to choose sin, if you continue to choose bad things, it just grows, because that's the reality of sin. So my life gets to be a little bit of a cautionary tear and a parable to my kids to teach that principle, because I want them to understand that. I want them to understand that sin grows, that it is serious, that it has consequences. And one of those consequences is that you might continue to pursue it in a direction to where all of a sudden you're doing worse things that can wreck your life. And boy, oh boy, at this point in First Samuel, we see that so clearly in the life of Saul. We have watched him repeatedly make the wrong decision. We've watched him repeatedly live in his own self interest and to choose sin and how that's grown over time. And we kind of are at the place where he hits rock bottom, where the choices he makes in chapter 28 reveal a heart that is headlong after sin. And my hope is that as we walk through this story and see the truth that is bound up in it, it would remind us and be a cautionary tale for us to take sin seriously. So I'm going to pray and then we're going to walk through the story together. Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us have ears to hear that we would not see this as simply a story that has all types of interesting details and then that's all it is. But we'd see it as your word that is revealing who you are and who you call us to be. May we have ears to hear and may we respond in the way that you would desire in faith and in repentance and in delighting in you above our own flesh and desires. In Jesus name, Amen.
All right, so where we pick up in 28. So we left off last week, where David, through I really think fear and not trusting the promises of God that he was going to be the future king, he goes to the land of the Philistines where he finds safety there. And that's where we pick up right where Chet left off last week in verse one.
> In those days the Philistines assembled and made war against Israel. And Achish said to David, "Know assuredly that you and your men shall go out with me to battle." And David said to Achish, "Very well; you shall know what your servant can do." And Achish said to David, "Very well; I will make you my bodyguard for life."
And it picks up with some context to set up the story in verse 3.
> Now Samuel died, and all Israel assembled and mourned for him and buried him at Ramah, his own city. And Saul had put the mediums and the necromancers out of the land.
All right, so we get some context here, something that we already saw a few chapters ago in chapter 25. We already know that Samuel is dead. We know his body is buried in rhema. Okay, that's an interesting context. Also, some things we didn't know that at one point, Saul, when he was doing the right thing, he kicks out all the mediums and the necromancers. These are people who were thought to summon dead spirits. So it's like, why are we being told about that? Buckle up. This story is. Is wild.
> And the Philistines assembled and came and encamped at Shunem. And Saul gathered all Israel, and they encamped at Gilboa. When Saul saw the camp of the Philistines, he was afraid, and his heart trembled greatly. And when Saul inquired of the LORD, the LORD did not answer him, either by dreams or by Urim or by prophets.
So as the Philistines are gathering, Saul is seeing this, and he's terrified. Long gone are the days where he heard about the Ammonites and them disrespecting the people of God. And the Spirit of God rushed upon him, and he rallied the people and they defeated them. He is now a scared king who can only see his enemy and is afraid. This is in verse six. And when Saul inquired of the Lord, the Lord did not answer him, either by dreams or by Urim or by prophets, which is a picture of. As kings would sometimes get dreams from the Lord. And he's been rejected as king. So that's not happening. That the priests. We saw this earlier. In 1st Samuel, the high priest had the Urim stone, the Thuman stone. These were stones that were used to help answer, we think, prayers in a yes or no kind of manner. But we saw that he killed most of the priests at Nob. So the priesthood isn't with him anymore. So he doesn't have his kingly office. He doesn't have help. He doesn't have the help of the priests. Also, the prophets are no longer with him. He's the Samuel has in his prophecy shown that he has been rejected. So you get a picture of prophet, priest and king, that all of it has abandoned him in leadership and he is alone.
> Then Saul said to his servants, "Seek out for me a woman who is a medium, that I may go to her and inquire of her." And his servants said to him, "Behold, there is a medium at En-dor."
All right, so Saul, scared, frightened, says, I will find someone to help me. I will go to a medium for help. The same mediums that he rightfully kicked out of the promised land, that he rightfully saw to get rid of because he followed the law. Then the book of Deuteronomy, in chapter 18, it says,
> "When you come into the land that the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a charmer or a consultant of ghosts, or one who inquires of the dead. For whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD."
Stop there. He knew the law. That's why he kicked him out in the first place. He knew that all these people with their evil practices did not belong amongst the people of God. And now he has chosen to go and receive help from there. Which brings up a lot of questions. And I just want to pause in the story to deal with some of those questions, because when you read this story, you have questions about, wait a second, do mediums really do that in the Bible? Do they really consult the spirits of the dead? And the follow up question is, does that still happen? Is that a thing that happens today? Now what we're about to read is the only kind of account of seeking a medium, a witch, a sorcerer, anything like that does in these evil practices. The only really detailed account like this that we get in the Bible, and still it doesn't answer all of our questions. But after looking at this and kind of surveying the rest of the scriptures and thinking through this, here are my general thoughts on how to think about this in light of how we think about this today. Mediums, witches, fortune tellers, many of them are indeed con artists. They're fraudsters, they're tricksters, which I don't think takes a lot of explaining for us, because I think that's the default position of the west, is that if you drive through West Columbia, and you see a palm reader, you see tarot cards, or you see someone dealing in fortune telling, you steal that kind of stuff. Our default position mostly is, and that's probably, probably somebody trying to steal your money. It's probably a con artist of some sort. But what I want to push us on here is that in the majority of the world, so the rest of the world, the not Western world, so South America, Africa, Asia, it is accepted that there are people that deal in these evil practices. They consult evil spirits, they consult evil things to gain information. And really, honestly, the majority of history has kind of accepted this as a thing that happens. It really is only until recent history. And I'll be honest, mostly if your background is more of a white Western background, you're more likely to kind of reject this outright and not see that actually this is something that actually truly does happen. And if you can step out of your position and to see how other people in the world view this and how the rest of history thinks through this, I think it expands our scope a little bit. That's what I've been trying to do over the last few years, the last decade of trying to pastor, because I still think that many of them are con artists. I still think that many of them actually do all types of tricks. But as I've tried to think about this more over the last decade of ministry and then even in pastoring and seeing this, that truly there are unseen demonic forces that are at work all the time, and there are people that consult these things, and what comes out of those experiences sometimes is demonic forces that pastoring people and seeing how this shows up in their life, I see it over and over and over again. So, yes, I think some absolutely are con artists. They're playing tricks. But others of them, when they're consulting someone's ancestor, when they're looking for, when someone's wanting to find out something from their grandmother, that what they're actually hearing on the other side of that is not just trickery, that it's actually demonic forces that are actually speaking to and through these people who are engaged in these evil practices. And we don't know all the things. There's a lot of things we don't understand about this, but I think both of those happen quite a bit. And I think that's helpful for us to think through this. And I think I don't know this, but I think that it's quite probably uncommon to have just immediate access to the spirits of those who have died. Now. I think that's important for us as we think about this, what this is. And also I think it's important to ask the question why anyone would engage in these practices in the first place. People engage in these practices because they're trying to understand things and have control over their next steps in their future. An insight that doesn't come from the Lord. I think that's really helpful to understand. I think going back to actually 1st Samuel 15 is incredibly helpful for this. Because in 1st Samuel 15, when the judgment from Samuel is being passed to Saul, he says something that's very helpful and, and how we should think about this. He says,
> "For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, he has also rejected you from being king."
What I find helpful about that judgment is it gives us a picture that there's some root issues behind all of this, that ultimately seeking mediums and necromancers is a rejection of the Creator for created things. It's a rejecting rejection of the word of the Lord to gain insight from the evil one, to gain insight to control your situation in life. I was reading a pastor in Africa, in Zambia, who regularly has to encounter people, people that are influenced by witchcraft and witch doctors. And one of the things that he was saying is that as they're seeking to really consult these practices because they have real practical things they want taken care of, they want their crops to grow and they want their kids to get better if they are sick, that as they're trying to control their future, what happens is as they go to these evil practices, it makes them slaves to two demonic forces that captivate and control their life. So the irony of going to seek control over your life by going to these practices, you invite forces in that actually begin to control you. And I thought that was a helpful insight into this to understand why people would do this and the danger that is bound up in doing this. I've seen this. I've sat with someone who engaged in occult practices in the past, and there were demonic forces in. In their life in the present, years later. And I know that our Western minds don't like to wrap our minds. That's hard for us to see. But it is a true spiritual reality now. It's a lot of context to how to think about this, to set up what we're about to. I think we should think about that as you see things from witchcraft to mediums, Ouija boards, Tarot cards, palm readings, even zodiac, horoscopes, and astrology, all of that is in an unseen spiritual realm. But if you are choosing to find insight to control your future by those practices, you are rejecting the Lord and his word and his counsel, and you are inviting evil into your life in a way that is extremely dangerous. Now, all that's helpful, and then we get this, what we're about to read, which is an incredibly unique experience all in itself. And trying to understand it is difficult, but I think we have some insight in how to understand this situation and also how this works broadly.
So now we're going back in the story.
> So Saul disguised himself and put on other garments and went, he and two men with him, and they came to the woman by night. And he said, "Divine for me by a spirit, and bring up for me whomever I shall name to you." And the woman said to him, "Behold, you know what Saul has done, how he has cut off the mediums and the necromancers from the land. Why then are you laying a trap for my life to bring about my death?" And Saul swore to her by the LORD, "As the LORD lives, no punishment shall come upon you for this thing." Then the woman said, "Whom shall I bring up for you?" He said, "Bring up Samuel for me." And when the woman saw Samuel, she cried out with a loud voice. And the woman said to Saul, "Why have you deceived me? You are Saul." And the king said to her, "Do not be afraid. What do you see?" And the woman said to Saul, "I see a god coming up out of the earth." And he said, "What is his appearance?" And she said, "An old man is coming up; he is wrapped in a robe." And Saul perceived that it was Samuel, and he bowed with his face to the earth and paid homage.
Then Samuel said to Saul, "Why then have you disturbed me, to bring me up?" And Saul answered, "I am in great distress, for the Philistines make war against me, and God has turned away from me and answers me no more, either by prophets or by dreams; therefore I have called you to tell me what I shall do." And Samuel said, "Why then do you ask me, since the LORD has turned from you and become your enemy? The LORD has done to you as he spoke by me. And the LORD has torn the kingdom out of your hand and given it to your neighbor David, because you did not obey the voice of the LORD and did not carry out his fierce wrath on Amalek. Therefore the LORD has done this thing to you this day. Moreover the LORD will give Israel also with you into the hand of the Philistines, and tomorrow you and your sons will be with me. The LORD will give the army of Israel also into the hand of the Philistines."
Then Saul fell full length on the earth and was very afraid because of the words of Samuel. And there was no strength in him, for he had eaten nothing all day and all night. And the woman came to Saul and saw that he was greatly terrified and said to him, "Behold, your servant has obeyed you; I have put my life in my hand and have listened to what you told me. Now therefore hear the voice of your servant; let me set a morsel of bread before you, and eat, that you may have strength when you go on your way." But he refused and said, "I will not eat." But his servants and the woman urged him, and he listened to their voice. So the woman took a calf that was fat and killed it at once, and she took flour and kneaded it and baked unleavened bread of it. And she brought it before Saul and his servants, and they ate. Then they rose and went away that night.
All right, so he goes to seek help from this woman. And you should feel really the sad nature of this, that he's taking off his kingly garments, he's disguising himself so he cannot be seen. It's pathetic. This once powerful king is having to do this to get help. It's a sad picture. So he disguises himself in the night, and he goes to her, and he said, divine for me, a spirit by me. Divine for me by a spirit, and bring up for me whomever I shall name to you. The woman said to him, surely you know what Saul has done, how he has cut off the mediums and the necromancers from the land. Why then are you laying a trap for my life to bring about my death? So he asks this, and she says, says, you realize the irony here is she can't see that it's Saul, but she clearly knows he's an Israelite. You realize that Saul kicked out all of the mediums. The necromancers, like you understand that you're putting me at risk here. She's nervous. And then Saul responds in verse 10. But Saul swore to her by the Lord, as the Lord lives, no punishment shall come upon you from. For this thing which y'. All that is wildly insane and wicked. Because what he just did was that he invoked the holy name of God to offer protection to a woman who is engaging in evil and demonic practices. That is gross blasphemy. And you're supposed to feel that as he invokes the holy name of God to protect this woman so that she will do this evil thing for him.
Then the woman said, whom shall I bring up for you? He said, bring up Samuel for me. When the woman saw Samuel, she cried out with a loud voice. And the woman said to Saul, why have you Deceived me. You are Saul. All right. It's impossible to know for sure what's logistically happening, but I think we can tell a few things. First, this woman did not expect to see Samuel. She is surprised. And when she sees that it's Samuel, she makes the connection that he saw. And she is scared. So she's shocked. And I would argue, I think the reason she's probably shocked that she actually saw and. And a spirit from someone who is dead is because this doesn't happen for her very often. So I think this woman probably is more on the con artist side of this. This is not a thing that normally happens. And if she is consulting evil spirits of some type, it doesn't look like this. So she's caught off guard by this, and she is scared. And once she connects all of this and she says, you are Saul, it says the king said to her, do not be afraid. What do you see? And the woman said to Saul, I see a God coming up out of the earth. Which, again, it's just. This is just shows how all the fools that are involved in here, Saul, a fool engaging this evil. She clearly does not understand how this works. She clearly cannot grasp what's happening. The best thing that she can do, best way she can describe this is it's like a God that's coming up out of the earth. 14 he said to her, what is the appearance? And she said, an old man is coming up and he is wrapped in a robe. And Saul knew that it was Samuel, and he bowed with his face to the ground and he paid homage.
So he sees that it's Samuel. And there's this question of that people have when they engage with this. It's like, how does this actually happen? How does an evil person like this, how is she able to bring up the actual spirit of Samuel? Samuel's body's buried in rhema, but somehow she's able to actually bring the spirit of Samuel up. How does this. Why is this even happening? Why does God allow this evil woman to engage in this evil practice to bring about the prophet Samuel? And I think the answer to that question, even I would probably argue that's not the normative thing that happens with the spirits of those who are dead. I think that why God in his sovereignty, allows this to happen in is exactly what we're about to read next. It has to do with what Samuel's going to say to Saul. So God allows it for the purposes of what's about to happen.
Then Samuel said to Saul, why Have you disturbed me by bringing me up? And Saul answered, I am in great distress, for the Philistines are warring against me, and God has turned away from me and answers me no more, either by prophets or by dreams. Therefore I have summoned you to tell me what I shall do. Which just shows the utter foolishness of where Saul is at this point in his life, that he thought that going to get a medium to engage in this evil and wicked and abominable practice to bring Samuel back for him, to help him. He's just. He's a fool. And something I've said multiple times in this series. Saul just. It's clear he doesn't know God. He just doesn't know God. If he thinks that this was going to work out well for him, he doesn't know the Lord. And then verse 16, Samuel said, why then do you ask me, since the Lord has turned from you and become your enemy? The Lord has done to you as he spoke by me. For the Lord has torn the kingdom out of your hand and given it to your neighbor and David, because you did not obey the voice of the Lord and did not carry out his fierce wrath against Amalek. Therefore the Lord has done this thing to you, done this thing to you. This day, moreover, the Lord will give Israel also with you into the hand of the Philistines. And tomorrow you and your sons shall be with me. The Lord will give the army of Israel also into the hand of the Philistines. So Samuel is brought up for this right here. I already told you, as I declared years ago, the judgment upon you, that the kingdom that you've been grasping onto for so long is not yours. It is being given away. And very soon tomorrow you and your sons in the battlefield will die, and you'll join me in death, and Israel will lose. That is why God and his sovereignty allows Samuel will be brought to declare that message. You are going to die tomorrow. Saul responds.
> Then Saul fell full length on the earth and was very afraid because of the words of Samuel. And there was no strength in him, for he had eaten nothing all day and all night.
Then the woman came to Saul, and when she saw that he was terrified, she said to him, behold, your servant has obeyed you I have taken my life in my hand and have listened to what you have said to me. Now therefore, you also obey your servant. Let me set a morsel of bread before you and eat, that you may have strength when you go on your way. And she's like, come on, eat, get out. At this point she's just like, get out of my home. Because she's taken her life in her hands and she wants him gone. And this medium is trying to get him up off the ground. He refused and said, I will not eat. But his servants together with the woman urged him and he listened to their words. So he arose from the earth and sat on the bed. And the woman had a fattened calf in the house and she quickly killed it. She took flour and kneaded it and baked unleavened bread of it. And she put it before Saul and his servants. And they ate. Then they rose and went away that night. And this is one of the final pictures we get of Saul. And it's sad. It's just sad. And when you think about this in light of his life, it's just like, how did he get here? How has he been so reduced to this sad scene, to having to trust in demonic forces and being told he's going to die? And when you take a step back from the story and you understand the life of Saul, it becomes very clear. He made one sinful decision after the next. He made one self interested decision after the next. And when you see that decision after decision after decision of how this played out, you understand that sin just grew in his life. You go back to 1 Samuel 13, you see that he makes the unlawful sacrifice that he was not supposed to. He disobeys the Lord. You see in 1st Samuel 14 he acts like a fool and he makes a rash vow. You see in 1st Samuel 15 that he refuses to obey the voice of the Lord and to slaughtering the king of the Amalekites. He refuses to do it. You see in 1st Samuel 18 that he tries to murder David. You see in 1st Samuel 19 he tries to murder him again. You see in 1 Samuel 22 he murders the majority of the priests at Nob and their wives and their children. And then from 23 onward, you see this endless pursuit to try to take the life of David, try to murder David and his men. And then he gets spared by David. And there's like a moment where he's sorry over his sin, but he's not truly repentant. And he continues in this. He continues to make sinful choices over and over and over again until his heart is so hardened he cannot see the utter wickedness of deciding that it was a good thing to go and seek the help of a medium. And that right there should serve as a cautionary tale for us. That we should understand the nature and the seriousness of sin and how it grows with every deliberate decision to pursue it. We should heed the wisdom of James chapter one that says,
> "But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire, when it has conceived, gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is fully grown, brings forth death."
That we should see the reality of when temptation comes and how that grows into this desire of sin and how we pursue it, and how when the sin comes, continues to grow in our life, develops, it seeks to destroy us and bring death to us. We should understand the seriousness of sin and how every decision can grow into further pursuing sin. Because here's what happens, y', all, is that sometimes we get so caught off guard by how someone could make such a sinful, foolish choice. People will say, I can't believe that he cheated on her. I can't believe that he would wreck his family and decide to do this. As if it's some surprise when in reality this is what sin does. That he was a man that from early on his teenage years was addicted to pornography and grew this unhealthy, sinful appetite that continued to grow over time. And then maybe he had some freedom when he got married for a moment, but he keeps running back to pornography, keeps running back to these sinful desires. And then in a season where his marriage isn't doing all that well, he gets the positive attention of a co worker. And it inflames that desire in him even further, which develops into lustful thoughts throughout the day, which develops into long lunches with her, which develops into hotel rooms. And it's not a surprise when you understand the nature of sin and how it grows. People will be shocked and ask, I can't believe those friends had this massive falling out. What happened? They were such good friends, like for so long now they seem so cold and distant towards one another. But it's the long road that gets you there of one thing after the next, that it starts with a comment, this person hurts their friend. And then instead of their friend doing the right God honoring thing to go to their friend, and after examining their own heart of why it hurt them to go and say, hey, you've actually hurt me, this was A hurtful thing to say. They just keep it to themselves, and they get angry, and then weeks later, they return fire. Typically, how it goes is, you know, you've been angry for weeks, and all of a sudden something that's completely unrelated just bubbles out in a way that just hurt. Where did that come from? And then no resolution happens there. No reconciliation happens there. Now there's relational weirdness that is set up in the friendship. And now they're both growing resentful, and they're unwilling to repent along the way until finally their eyes see towards each other. They're cold, they're distant, they're calloused. And it's like it was one bad decision after the next. People will be surprised when someone steals from their company. I can't believe that he robbed his company. He's going to prison. Like, what was he thinking? And again, you have to follow the progression here. These things happen over time with decision after decision that years ago that he was a person that started to finally make money. Instead of submitting his finances to the Lord and growing in generosity, he said, I want to spend on myself. And he's continued to fill his life with riches and all types of pleasures. And then as he began to fill his life with things and upholding things over the Creator, he started to grow some debt in his life. And then all of a sudden, there was an easy way to maneuver a little bit of money in a way that no one would ever see. And then he continues this and continues to buy more things and continues to set his heart on material things. And more debt is growing, and more debt is growing. And then all of a sudden, he's in a lot of debt and has some big decisions to make, and there's a big move that he shouldn't have made. And all of a sudden he makes it, and now he's facing prison time. Do you see how this works? Sinful choices that we make over and over and over again. I'll give you one more. People will ask, I can't believe that church split in two. I can't believe that this group all of a sudden just fell apart. What happened there? And y', all, it just. It's. It is a slow fade into this type of disunity. It usually starts with someone who just goes to someone else in their group or goes to someone else in their church and says, I need to vent. I need to. This is the way. This is the holy way to do it. I need the process. Just need to process with you. And then loose Lips rolls out into some gossip, and all of a sudden there's gossip in the air and distrust is in the air. And then eventually slander comes out. And then someone comes back and says, hey, I heard that you said this about me. What's going on with that? And then sides are taken. No one does what they're supposed to do in repenting of their sin and seeking reconciliation God commands us to do. Sides are taken, hearts grow hard and they part their separate ways. This happens over and over and over again. And that's what happened with Saul. He continued to make sinful choices, cementing the position of his heart. And some of you right now have what you might consider to be baby small sins in your life. Maybe some of us have these respectable sins in our lives that we don't think are a big deal. Maybe there's some hidden sin in our lives. And what we do is we justify ourselves, our actions, our thoughts. Thoughts. Are we minimized and say, that's not that big of a deal. Are we covered up with a veneer of righteousness that says, yeah, I know I got this going on. I haven't really confessed it to anyone, but I'm still doing these things. And then that grows, and then it grows and it influences the next decision and the next decision and the next decision, and then it destroys us. We should heed Hebrews chapter three in a way that should sober our souls to reality.
> "Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called 'Today,' that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin."
And the warning there is, be careful in choosing sin, lest you actually, in your pursuit of sin, finally realize that your heart wasn't rooted in belief in the first place, receive the warning of the seriousness of sin, and hope that you have people in your life that will point you. That will point out the choices that you are making, that will ask the tough questions, that will notice the patterns in your life that reveal something beneath the surface that when you dip out for two or three months and you make lots of excuses about not being around, that someone will come into your life, the word of God will come into your life and will reveal what's happening before you, harden your heart in a direction that you do not come back from. We should receive the warning here that we're only a few steps away from wrecking our lives.
Now, here's the good news while Saul chooses evil and he meets this very sad end. We have the opportunity to choose Christ. We have the opportunity to delight in him, to run to him. We have the opportunity to actually turn from path of destruction towards Christ. We have the opportunity to end humility, humble ourselves before the Lord, and pray for a softened heart. We have the opportunity to have groups of Christians in our community group that we have people in our lives that at a moment's notice will give us the ear that we need to listen to begin to walk in the light. We have the opportunity and some of you have the opportunity 4 be very first time to actually choose Christ over the desires of our own flesh and following the ways of the world, influenced by the enemy himself, we have Christ and that's his desire for us. I so appreciate 2 Corinthians 5:15 that says,
> "and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised."
that he died for us, that we on the path towards sin and hell might actually see that we had a Savior who bled and died for our sinful choices, for our bad trajectory, so that we might actually live not to ourselves, but but in submission to Him. And that is my hope as we leave this story today. Do not let the sins in your life grow and expand in a way that would suffocate your soul. Do not live for yourself like Saul did live for Christ, who for our sake died and was raised to free us from choosing evil. Pray for us. Heavenly Father, I pray that you would sober us to the reality of sin in our lives and you would awaken us to the joy that is found and understanding that while we sinned against you, you bled and died for our trespasses that we might trust in you of our own selves. Lord, we cannot do that without your work in our hearts. Lord, may you work in our souls in a way to awaken us to the reality of sin and the reality of your redemptive work on the cross in an empty tomb in Jesus name. Amen.
We're going to prepare to take the Lord's Supper here in a moment. I want to read from Luke chapter 22.
> And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he said, "Take this, and divide it among yourselves. For I tell you that from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes." And he took bread, and when he had given thanks he broke it and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me." And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, "This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood."
That as Christians we get to come to the table remembering that yes, we make sinful choices and yes, we pursue sin, and yes, we have hidden sin in our life that we need to actually respond by walking in the light. We have all those things. But the offer of Christ is you don't come in your perfection, you don't come in your righteousness, you don't come in your good works. You come needy, humbly rejoicing that his blood was poured out, that his body was broken. And we remember the good news of the gospel that is for, for us, the sinners. So as you consider your sin, consider your Savior. When you are ready, come joyfully to the table. Some of you, you have not actually fully trusted in the work of Christ. Some of you, if you're honest with yourself that your whole life has been won towards only pursuing sin. And where there's been bits of religiousness, where there's been bits of church attendance, where there's been bits of just doing some good things, those are a cover for a life that is fully captured by sin. And my hope right now is that God would soften your heart and open your eyes to the reality that that only leads to death. But the good news of the gospel is that Jesus dies for sinners and that you would not come to the table. Do not come to the table right now. Come to Christ in faith, trusting in his work. And my hope is you wouldn't leave here today without talking to someone, talking to a pastor, talking to anyone, and asking them what does it look like to actually follow Jesus. And then we can talk about what it means to come to the table. But Christians, when you're ready to come to the table, there's gluten free in that back corner and upstairs.
1 Samuel 26-27
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. Grab a Bible and go to First Samuel. We're in chapters 26, 27, and just a little bit of 28 this morning. We are working our way through the book of First Samuel. We are studying it together and trying to learn together what this book has to teach us as we follow this Jesus.
The section that we're looking at today, we're going to look at this story, this saga in the life of David and how he, the Lord, is obviously at work, and then some decisions that David makes following a situation that he has with Saul and kind of what flows out of that. My hope this morning is that we can be instructed by it to see that what David does is something that we are prone to do, so that we might see David's example, learn from it, and not repeat it. So that's the hope for us this morning as we study this text together.
We're going to be in chapter 26, verse 1. If you grab one of the blue Bibles, it'll be on page 142. If you don't own a Bible, take this one home with you. I mean, not the one I'm holding, the one you're holding. You can take that one home with you. We want you to own a Bible. We want you to have it, we want you to read it.
Chapter 26 says this.
> Then the Ziphites came to Saul at Gibeah, saying, "Is not David hiding himself on the hill of Hakalah, which is on the east of Jeshimon?"
This is almost word for word what happened in chapter 23, verse 19. The Ziphites have come to Saul again and said, "Hey, he's in the same area again." Not exactly in the south, it's in the east. But he's here and he's hiding again. When I was growing up, if you tattled, my dad was prone to call someone who told on somebody a rat fink. The more I've talked to people about this, the more I may be the only person who's ever heard that phrase. I don't know. But that's what I think when I read about the Ziphites. They're rat finks. They keep narcing on David every time he tries to hide. They're supposed to be from his tribe. They're from the tribe of Judah. They shouldn't be telling on him, but that's what they're doing. And so they tell Saul again, "Hey, David's here. He's hiding."
Verse 2 says,
> So Saul arose and went down to the wilderness of Ziph with 3,000 chosen men of Israel to seek David in the wilderness of Ziph.
Saul has 3,000 chosen men. David has 600 random people who owed people debts and were unhappy that have shown up with him. So Saul's got a better force here. The text says Saul encamped on the hill of Hakalah, which is beside the road on the east of Jeshimon. He goes right where they told him.
It says, but David remained in the wilderness. When he saw that Saul came after him into the wilderness, David sent out spies and learned that Saul had indeed come. He sees some sort of sign that Saul has come. He sends out spies to lay eyes on him. And indeed he has come.
Then it says,
> Then David rose and came to the place where Saul had encamped. And David saw the place where Saul lay with Abner, the son of Ner, the commander of his army. Saul was lying within the encampment while the army was encamped around him.
It seems that he sneaks over there in the evening, looks at them, sees how they're set up. 3,000 men camping. Saul's in the middle. Then David said to Ahimelech the Hittite, and to Joab's brother Abishai, the son of Zeruiah, who will go down with me into the camp of Saul? Abishai said, "I will go down with you."
David seems to take these two guys with him to go spy this out, or a handful of guys with him to go spy this out. He looks at these two specific guys and says, who wants to sneak with me into that camp of 3,000 guys who came here to murder us? Abishai says, "I'll go." We don't know what David's plan is. We just know Abishai, he's ready to go. Ahimelech was like, no thank you, stay here. I'll watch this stuff.
David and Abishai went to the army by night, and there lay Saul sleeping within the encampment with his spear stuck in the ground at his head; Abner and the army lay around him. So they go all the way through. They make it there. They see Saul sleeping. Now, Saul always has his spear with him to the point that I half expected him to hug it while he slept. But he doesn't. He has it right next to his head.
Then Abishai said to David,
> "God has given your enemy into your hand this day. Now please let me pin him to the earth with one stroke of the spear. I will not strike him twice."
It'll be very easy.
David said to Abishai,
> "Do not destroy him, for who can put out his hand against the Lord's anointed and be guiltless? As the Lord lives, the Lord will strike him, or his day will come to die, or he will go down into battle and perish."
At this moment, I always remember, and I want to remind you, as David gives three different ways that Saul might possibly die. They're somehow whispering this to each other while Saul's asleep somewhere close enough to them. This conversation isn't just the conversation they're having. It's like Abishai is like, "Kill me." And David's going, "So I don't know exactly how David is telling him three different ways, because David's like, look, God will kill him, or he'll just die somehow, or he'll go into battle and die." It feels like it was covered in the second one. Like his day will come. And then maybe a little bit of distance. They're whispering. Maybe they're very close to each other, but somehow they're having this hushed conversation about what they're going to do with Saul. I wonder if Abishai is like, "Then why did we come here? What are we doing?" But David says, don't do this.
Verse 11 says,
> "The Lord forbid that I should put out my hand against the Lord's anointed. But take now the spear that is at his head, and the jar of water, and let us go."
David took the spear and the jar of water from Saul's head and they went away. No man saw it or knew it, nor did any awake, for they were all asleep because a deep sleep from the Lord had fallen upon them.
That makes a little more sense. God helps David in what David is going to do. It doesn't tell us whether or not David, like, we don't know anything about God telling him to go do this or David asking about it. It just seems like David says, "Hey, let's go do this," and then God backs him up and helps him. But there's no one on guard, no one watching. This is terrible. You don't take 3,000 men to go fight someone and be like, "All right, everybody get a good night's sleep. We'll get up in the morning." Like, you have people guard and watch and pay attention, but not here, not in Saul's camp. They sneak in and do this.
One of the things that's happening in the book of First Samuel here is that we're being shown very clearly — and the people who were the original hearers of this, readers of this, are being shown very clearly — that David was not out to get Saul. He could have killed him in the cave when it was just David and Saul. His men were there, but David's the one who snuck up. David's not going to kill him. But David's also not going to have one of his men kill him. David could have let Abishai kill him, and then Abishai could take the guilt. But David says, "I don't want you to have the guilt for killing him. He's the Lord's anointed. We're going to trust the Lord in this." So David at no point is trying to overthrow Saul. He's not trying to kill him. And it's very clear.
Verse 13:
> Then David went over to the other side and stood far off on the top of the hill with a great space between them. And David called to the army and to Abner, the son of Ner, saying, 'Will you not answer, Abner?' Then Abner answered, 'Who are you who calls to the king?'
David said to Abner:
> "Are you not a man? And who is like you in Israel? Why then have you not kept watch over your Lord the king? For one of the people came in to destroy the king, your Lord. This thing that you have done is not good. As the Lord lives, you deserve to die, because you have not kept watch over your Lord, the Lord's anointed."
David's shouting at the encampment at night. He's very far away on another hill. Abner is woken up out of sleep in a kind of dangerous place. Someone's shouting, trying to figure out what's going on. Like, okay, not immediately in battle. They're trying to listen. Who's yelling? What is this about? He starts kind of running his mouth. "Abner, I thought you were a man," that's his opening line.
Then David says this:
> "And now see where the king's spear is and the jar of water that was at his head."
I think that felt braggy or not connected to anything until he says, "Where's his spear?" At that moment, they had cold chills. "Oh, he was here in the middle of us. Who was on guard? Who was watching what happened?" He had the opportunity. He's telling the truth.
Verse 17:
> Saul recognized David's voice and said, "Is this your voice, my son David?"
David said,
> "It is my voice, my lord, O king."
Saul said,
> "Why does my lord pursue after his servant? For what have I done? What evil is on my hands now? Therefore, let my lord the king hear the words of his servant. If it is the Lord who has stirred you up against me, may he accept an offering. But if it is men, may they be cursed before the Lord, for they have driven me out this day that I should have no share in the heritage of the Lord, saying, 'Go serve other gods.'"
David says, "What have I done?" The answer is nothing. He's done nothing to Saul. He's had the opportunity to do things after Saul started trying to kill him, but he's done nothing. He hasn't tried to overthrow him. He hasn't plotted against him. He hasn't tried to become king. He was just going to serve him. He is his servant. He says, "What is this?" And he says, "If the Lord stirred you up, then let me make a sacrifice. Let some peace be made between me and the Lord. But if it's men, let them be cursed, because I've done nothing, and they're running me out of my homeland and telling me to just go belong to someone else."
Verse 20:
> "Now therefore, let not my blood fall to the earth away from the presence of the Lord, for the king of Israel has come out to seek a single flea, like one who hunts a partridge in the mountains."
He says, "You've done all this for someone who doesn't matter, like a massive hunt for one bird." He says, "Don't let me die away from the presence of the Lord." He wants to stay.
Verse 21:
> Then Saul said, "I have sinned. Return my son David, for I will no more do you harm, because my life was precious in your eyes this day. Behold, I have acted foolishly and have made a great mistake."
It would be nice if Saul meant this. He is not genuinely repenting. It's very similar to stuff he said before, and as the story goes on, he's just going to take right back up with what he's doing.
David answered and said,
> "Here is the spear, O king. Let one of the young men come over and take it. The Lord rewards every man for his righteousness and his faithfulness, for the Lord gave you into my hand today, and I would not put out my hand against the Lord's anointed."
David earlier yells, "What have I done? What wrong have I done? What evil is on my hands?" And here he says:
> "The Lord rewards faithfulness and righteousness."
When you're reading the Psalms, there are times where David says, "Judge me, Lord. Try me. What have I done?" I don't think David means he has never sinned. I think David is talking about these kinds of things where he's on the run, and he's saying, Lord, what did I do to deserve the situation that I'm in? And I found that helpful as I was studying this, to think about David in this mindset when he's writing some of those Psalms because he doesn't mean to articulate, "I'm perfect in all things," but he's saying, "My hands are clean. I haven't done what I'm being accused of."
Verse 16:
> "Behold, as your life was precious this day in my sight, so may my life be precious in the sight of the Lord, and may he deliver me out of all tribulation."
Then Saul said to David,
> "Blessed be you, my son David. You will do many things and will succeed in them."
David went his way and Saul returned to his place. So David has another chance to kill Saul; he doesn't take it. Saul leaves. David goes his way.
Chapter 27, verse 1:
> Then David said in his heart, "Now I shall perish one day by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than that I should escape to the land of the Philistines. Then Saul will despair of seeking me any longer within the borders of Israel, and I shall escape out of his hand."
After this situation where the Lord protects David again, David's able to walk into an encampment of 3,000 soldiers. They're all asleep. David considers this, and it says he said in his heart, "Saul's going to kill me." That's the conclusion that he draws as he's been on the run. Saul doesn't seem to ever be going to let up. He just decides, Saul's going to kill me. Then he says, there's nothing better for me to do than to go live with the Philistines, which is the very first thing he tried, if you remember.
He went and he got Goliath's sword, and he went to Achish, the king of Gath. Then they were like, "Hey, isn't that David?" He pretended to be insane. Achish said to his guards,
> "Why have you brought me an insane person? What use is he to me?"
David escaped. But now, some time later, David decides that's his best option. Now, I have a question: when we're reading this text, when David says that, when it says that David said in his heart, "There's nothing better for me to do than to go to the Philistines." Did we all go, "Finally he figured it out"? No, I don't think so. I don't read that and think, "What a great plan." You go, "Hold on a second. Did you pray about this? God's with you? Did you ask him? He's a prophet of the Lord. Did you ask him? The Ephod's with you? You've inquired of the Lord before. Did you talk to the priest? Did you work?" It's just something that he comes to a conclusion in and of himself. He just considers it, says this in his heart, locks it in.
What we're going to see in chapter 27 is David locks this decision in his heart, and then he just starts doing stuff. All the things he does make some sense if this is true — if the best thing for him is to just go to the Philistines — then everything else he does just kind of starts making sense. The problem is, I don't think that's the best thing for him. And I don't think if he'd have consulted the Lord, that's what he would have been told to do. But he just decides this in his heart, and he just goes. Then he's going to start making some logical conclusions as he goes ahead.
It says:
> So David arose and went over, he and the 600 men who were with him, to Achish, the son of Maacah, king of Gath. David lived with Achish at Gath, he and his men, every man with his household, and David with his two wives, Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail of Carmel, Nabal's widow. When it was told Saul that David had fled to Gath, he no longer sought him.
Some interesting things happen here. First, David gets some confirmation. Saul quits looking for him, which means that Saul wasn't repentant. He just decides, "Well, now he's in the land of the Philistines. I'm not going to chase him anymore." He didn't actually mean, "You're safe with me. Come be my friend again." He didn't mean that. He only stops when he goes to the Philistines.
It also means that David immediately probably was like, "I knew I was right." So he makes this decision, "This is the best thing for me," and then he gets some confirmation. Almost immediately, Saul quits looking for him. He goes, "Yes, I did it. I knew I was right. I knew that was the best thing to do."
Also, it means that David and 600 men and all of their families go to live with Achish and Gath. That's a pile of people. David goes back to the exact same guy that he went to last time. The text doesn't tell us anything about that. But I wonder if Achish was like, "Have we met before?" And David was like, "Nope, don't think so." But then he knew where stuff was around the city, and it got real suspicious. His phone automatically connected to the Wi-Fi. There were some things that were like, "Wait a second."
David goes to Achish, and Achish lets him be there. It makes some sense too because David is Saul's enemy, prime enemy of a Kish. The Philistines hate the Israelites, and David's a great warrior. If he'll join our team, that sounds great. Similar to us having a bunch of German scientists come to the US during World War II. "Yeah, if you'll come be on our team, that'd be great." That's what he does. He just lets them come in.
David said to Achish,
> "If I have found favor in your eyes, let a place be given me in one of the country towns, that I may dwell there, for why should your servant dwell in the royal city with you?"
It's quite possible that David's working an angle and he's trying to accomplish something, trying to get away from Achish. But it's also very problematic that David, the anointed of the Lord who's going to be king of the people of Israel, is having to seek favor with Achish, the enemy of the Israelites. But it makes sense, as long as we follow the train, that it's the best thing for him to do; then going to Achish makes sense. Asking for the favor of Achish makes sense. It kind of follows along with what he's going to keep doing. All line up with this original assumption that David made certain in his heart.
He apparently has found favor. It says:
> So that day Achish gave him Ziklag. Therefore Ziklag has belonged to the kings of Judah to this day. The number of days that David lived in the country of the Philistines was a year and four months.
David makes this decision, and it affects at least the next year and four months of how he's going to live life. Also, Achish just gives him a city. I don't know if that city was sitting empty, but I doubt it. That was probably surprising for the people who lived in Ziklag when a bunch of Jewish people showed up and were like, "We're in charge now." That's what happens, and they keep it forever.
Verse 8:
> Now David and his men went up and made raids against the Geshurites and the Amalekites, for these were the inhabitants of the land from of old as far as Shur to the land of Egypt.
David starts making raids. Before, David would go out with the army, and it would talk about him basically defending against the Philistines. But now he's not going to war like normal. He's making raids. It's a different word. He's doing what you think of as pillaging and plundering. That's what he starts doing. He starts doing it with the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites.
The Amalekites we've heard of; that’s the people Saul was supposed to get rid of and didn't. The Geshurites are listed as people who were supposed to be pushed out of the land and weren't. The Girzites are only ever mentioned right here in this verse. That's all we know about them.
David starts making raids against these people.
Verse 9:
> David would strike the land and would leave neither man nor woman alive but would take away the sheep, the oxen, the donkeys, the camels, and the garments and come back to Achish. When Achish asked, "Where have you made a raid today?" David would say, "Against the Negeb of Judah," or "against the Negeb of the Jerahemites," or "against the Negeb of the Kenites."
Negeb is like a southern dry area. David is saying, "I'm kind of working my way along against these groups of people." He picked people that were either people of Israel or their allies. He goes and attacks this one group and then comes back, gives Achish stuff and lies about who he's been attacking.
It says he kills all the men and women. Some want to read this and say, "Okay, well, David's just fulfilling what they were supposed to fulfill from when Joshua was taking the land. He's driving these people out. He's committing holy war." There are a couple of problems with that. It's called raids, not war. If it's holy war and he's supposed to perform a ban on them, he's not supposed to take the stuff, but he takes the stuff. So he's committing raids.
Verse 11:
> David would leave neither man nor woman alive to bring news to Gath, thinking lest they should tell about us.
David has done so strategically. It doesn't say he's doing it to fulfill promises or to do what God called him to. It says he's strategically not letting anyone live so that no one tells on them.
David decides the best thing for him to do is go live with the Philistines, and then he just starts making decisions downline on what makes sense, what makes sense. It's clever, cunning, strategic. He absolutely tricks Achish, the king of Gath. But it's hard to say that it's faithful and honest, that he has integrity. It’s hard to read this and make it virtuous.
Verse 12:
> Achish trusted David, thinking he has made himself an utter stench to the people of Israel. Therefore he shall always be my servant.
Achish believes him. He doesn't double-check any of that. Nobody comes and gives any report of anything. Otherwise, he would see all the stuff. He thinks, "David has made everybody there absolutely hate him."
Chapter 28 says:
> In those days, the Philistines gathered their forces for war to fight against Israel. Achish said to David, "Understand that you and your men are to go out with me in the army."
David said to Achish,
> "Very well, you shall know what your servant can do."
Achish said,
> "Very well, I will make you my bodyguard for life."
Then the story just changes subjects and starts talking about Saul and what he's up to. So we're going to stop right here.
David has worked himself into a knot. Achish looks at him and says, "We're going to war with the Israelites, and we know how much you hate them and how much they hate you." The text says that David says, "Good, you'll see what I'm capable of." We're all like, "What does that mean? What I'm capable of killing? Who is he going to kill? Israelites? Is he going to turn against his own people?" That's some cryptic, clever way to say, "You about to find out." Achish says, "Good, I'll make you my bodyguard for life." If David means he's going to attack him, I bet David thought, "Well, that'll be short. I won't be your bodyguard for very long." We don't know. We don't know what David is about to do.
The text will change and tell another story on purpose. The Bible is well written. It gets us right here and goes, "What's going on with that?" Then it goes over here and starts talking about something else.
I think it is helpful for us to consider how David got himself from standing over Saul absolutely seeing God at work to marching out with the Philistines, how he worked himself over here. I'll go back to chapter 27, verse 1:
> David said in his heart, "Now I shall perish one day by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than that I should escape to the land of the Philistines."
It says David said it in his heart. He didn't talk it out. It doesn't even say he really reasoned it. He just hearted it out. He felt it just became real. It was very concrete. It would be hard to shake him off of this position.
What I think is helpful is for us to understand that we do that, too. There are some conclusions that you've drawn, and you've got some external circumstances that help back you up. You're not crazy. You didn't just come up with something, but you've got some external circumstances that help you back up.
But all that's really happened is you've just reasoned this out in your heart, and it's real, real, real, real, real, real for you. You believe it almost unshakably, and then it just begins to show up. It makes a lot of sense if this is true.
I've been pastoring this church for 12 years, and I want to share a few of these. I want to give some examples to help you picture what we're talking about, what we're capable of doing, what you're capable of as life plays out settling in your heart:
"I'm unlovable." You can point to this relationship, this friendship, this marriage, this stuff. It's obvious. You don't really think it out, you don't really write it out. You just settle it in your heart, and then it begins to show up in how you relate to people.
So what happens is that somebody in your community group who's trying to follow Jesus, studying the Bible, but you've got this as a set reality for you. Someone in your group who loves you dearly is trying to talk to you over here on this situation. They're making good points, and you listen, and you know that what they're saying is true for everybody but you. You know that's fine. What they're saying is good, but they don't know this about you. If they knew this, they would know that it doesn't really apply to you.
So you begin to undercut the way they're relating to you. They're coming to you and saying, "Hey, we really like our group. You were around, and things were going well. Now you're kind of gone. We want to follow up with you because we care. We miss you. We wish you were back around. We want you back around."
They say it's helpful, healthy for you to belong and be here. We're not us without you. They're trying to talk to you about this.
You're going, "Yeah, that's just what you're supposed to say. It's good that you're saying that. But I know this, and nobody really loves me." Or they're saying, "We love you," and you're going, "Hmm. No." If you knew the real me, you wouldn't. If I really belonged, if I really told you everything, you wouldn't.
You've got some sort of settled position that you've already locked in.
"I ruin everything I touch." You've got some evidence. You've really messed some things up, but you've settled in your heart at some point that "I ruin everything." It begins to show up. Something gets difficult at work, and your energy level to try to fix it just drops because, you know, if I pour energy into this, it's just going to fail. Something gets difficult in a relationship, marriage, friendship, church family. You start going, "Yeah, but people are going, hey, we can work this out. We can figure this out."
You're thinking, "I'm actually doing you a favor by backing out now because if I step in, I'll just make it worse." You don't necessarily word it that way, but that's so true in your heart that it undoes the ability for people to address you.
"I can only trust myself. Can't trust anybody else. Can't have real relationships. I'm the only person who's trustworthy. I can only take counsel with myself. I can't do it." You just repeat over and over, "I can't do it. It."
"I have to be the one in control. If my hands are not on the steering wheel, this ain't gonna work out." You've decided, locked it in, and it's real. You start doing stuff that makes sense if that's true.
"I just don't have enough. Just don't have enough money. Don't have enough power, wisdom, control," whatever you want to put there, "I just don't have enough of it. If I could get it, I'd be okay."
"Things will never get better. The sooner I realize that, the better off I am. The sooner I realize that when I get in a situation, the better off I am."
It helps me to know that nothing will ever get better. This applies to how you relate to people, how you take correction, how you correct other people, how you walk in life, live, serve, work — everything.
Some of your actions make perfect sense as long as that's true.
I want to show you the list. These are things that I know I've interacted with in people, could be anything.
Now, I'll make a few comments on the list. You may have a completely different one. Some might be true if you don't belong to Jesus. Even when you feel these things, none of you as you walk in church family, in community group, say these things to other people. You would not counsel somebody this way.
You've never looked at someone who's struggling and said, "Hey, look at me. I know you're hurting. Things will never get better, but one day you'll die." You've never done that. You might say that to yourself a thousand times a week, but you don't say it to other people because you know what it sounds like. You don't believe it for others but 100% believe it for yourself.
"Hey, you haven't been around group for a while. I just want you to know you're unlovable. Nobody cares. If we really got to know you, it would just get worse."
You don't do that.
The reason we're laughing is that it sounds insane. That's why we work these things out in our heart. We don't work them out out loud. You just talk to yourself about it. You say, "Yeah, but I heard it a thousand times." It's like mispronouncing a word and saying, "That's the way I hear it." It's because you're saying it that way. Stop it. Say it the right way, and you won't hear it that way anymore because no one else says it that way.
Some of these might be true if you don't belong to Jesus, if you haven't trusted in him, if he hasn't saved you from your sin, if his death doesn't apply to you, if his resurrection doesn't apply to you so that your sin's paid for, life is given to you. If you aren't found in Christ, then you can't do it. You're not going to earn it. You're not going to save yourself. You're not going to be good enough, smart enough, moral enough, strong enough.
One of the proclamations of the gospel is you can't do it, but Jesus can. So some of these might apply.
If you belong to Jesus and you've accepted one of these heart-level things or some new one that you came up with, that you've settled in your heart, can I tell you something? You believe it because you think it's true about you, but actually, if you belong to Jesus, it is a lie about him. It's only true if he's not there.
"I'm unlovable." You think that says something about you, but it's actually a declaration about Christ that he doesn't love you, that he can't love you, that he can't overcome your wickedness, that he can't overcome your sin, that you've done too much, that you aren't enough, and somehow you think it's about you, but if you belong to Jesus, it's a lie about him, and it's not true.
I love where Paul says,
> "Christ died for me."
Paul writes "me." He's saying no, no, no, me. We get to read that and go, "Yeah, if I belong to Jesus, me." He loved me and gave himself up for me.
"I ruin everything I touch." Sure, without Jesus, maybe, probably not everything. But without Jesus? No.
"I can only trust myself." We get to trust Jesus. You actually don't factor that in. That's beautiful about belonging to Christ. It's not about me. That's why we show up and sing about Jesus and what he's done and accomplished. We don't have blanks where you get to insert your own name about how you've saved the day. We don't do that because that's not what this is about. That's not where our hope is.
"I can't do it." That's a declaration that everything is going to fall apart. Like Jesus won't empower you, won't give you strength, mercy tomorrow. You won't wake up with renewed ability through the empowerment of the Spirit.
"I have to be the one in control." It's a declaration that Jesus isn't trustworthy, that he's not good enough, and that you can't trust yourself with him.
"I don't have enough." Even though we've been seated with him above all things, and we've been given every spiritual gift in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
"Things will never get better" is only true if you don't belong to Jesus. If you belong to Jesus, he's already working. He's already redeeming, and the promises — it ultimately gets better.
> Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
> — 2 Corinthians 5:17
He has gone to work in us and made us new.
These things aren't true. They don't stick to you. They don't hold you. They don't have claim over you if you belong to Jesus and have trusted him. If you haven't, you can. You can go to Christ and say, "I need help. I need salvation. I need rescue. I need forgiveness," and he will.
Here's what I want us to do.
> We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ.
> — 2 Corinthians 10:5
I want you to actively take this heart-level decision and introduce it to Jesus. I want you to make those two in your mind. I want you to make it obedient to Christ. How is this real if I belong to Jesus? Bring it to him and say, "I want to look at this in light of who you are. I want to look at this in light of what your word says. I want to look at this in light of what your word says about me."
In just a moment, I'm going to pray. The band's going to come back up. I want you to take a second to ask the Spirit, "Is there something that I've settled in my heart that's guiding the decisions I'm making but isn't true? Is there something that I only believe for me that I wouldn't believe for somebody else? I would never counsel somebody else this way. I would never accuse Jesus of this out loud. I'm just doing it in my heart."
Then I want you to make it obedient to Christ. We'll take a moment to do that. Then I want you to do that this week with your community group. I want you to try to walk out, "What have I settled? That only makes sense because I don't say it out loud. I just repeat it over and over again in my heart. How does Jesus rescue and redeem and conquer?"
Let's pray.
Father, I pray that right now you'd give us a moment of stillness and clarity. We ask in the name of Jesus that your Spirit would work to reveal deep, heart-level things that we've put in concrete that aren't true, lies that we believe, that we think are true about us, but are just lies about you. Lord, we ask you to help us to listen. Amen.
1 Samuel 25
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning, my name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. Grab a Bible and go to First Samuel, chapter 25. We are working our way through the book of First Samuel. We left off last week where David had the opportunity to murder Saul. Saul's been chasing David, trying to kill him. David finally has Saul right in his grasp in a cave and he does not kill him. He comes, cuts off a piece of his cloak, follows him out of the cave and says, see this? Do you notice that it used to belong to your cloak? Check out your cloak. I could have killed you and I didn't because I don't want to.
Saul and David have this moment where Saul says, I'm wrong, I shouldn't be doing what I'm doing. There's a little bit of a peace. Then it says they head separate ways. We're picking up in chapter 25, and we're going to see this interaction with David and some other people, and we're going to see David actively pursuing sin and how God meets him in that, what happens, how David responds, and how these other people respond. Hopefully, we will learn along with David to appreciate correction.
The verse says this:
> Now Samuel died, and all Israel assembled and mourned for him and buried him in his house at Ramah.
Samuel has passed and his work as the last judge is over. He's the last judge of Israel. He has transitioned under the leadership of God and under the desire of the people to a monarch ruling the land. It hasn't gone well. We've seen how all that's worked out. The last we saw him, David had run to him to try to hide while Saul was chasing him. He is now passed, and it says all Israel gathered to mourn. I think it is likely that that included David and Saul, but if it excluded one of them, it was probably David. The way the text is written seems as if David was there.
It also says that Samuel was buried in his house at Ramah, which makes me think people didn't keep living in that house. I don't know; maybe it became a site for the people of Israel, but the text doesn't give us much information about that.
Continuing in verse 1, it says:
> Then David rose and went down to the wilderness of Paran. And there was a man whose business was in Carmel.
The man was very rich. He had 3,000 sheep and a thousand goats. Take a moment and try to picture that. That's a lot of sheep and goats, a lot of people that have to tend to them. The man was shearing his sheep in Carmel. Now, you may have a picture of what shearing sheep is like. You understand that it's removing the excess wool from a sheep. But culturally, when we just say he's shearing his sheep, I don't think we completely capture the festivity.
This was festive. In order to shear 3,000 sheep, you need a lot of shearers. They gather, it's like a harvest. You've kept these sheep alive all winter; it's now about to get hot, and it's spring. They gather. It's celebratory. A bunch of people together. The wool means wealth—he can use it, he can sell it. People gather, eat, celebrate, shear sheep, and then eventually they have to spread back out because you can't have that many sheep in one place at one time.
So they've been all over the place, gather, shear the sheep, have a festival for however long this takes, a bunch of people together, then spread back out. That's what's happening. Culturally, when they heard "sheep shearing," it's like us hearing it's Christmas time. It's festive in their mind with all it entails.
He's shearing his sheep. Verse 3:
> Now the name of the man was Nabal, and the name of his wife Abigail.
There's another cultural thing missed on us here: the word Nabal means fool or boorish; his name is "fool." If you spoke Hebrew, you'd catch that. Names mean things in their culture. Either it was a rough time in the life of his parents when he was born and they took it out on him, or he was born and his mom said, "You look a lot like your father; we're gonna name you Fool." Some family dynamics we don't want to get into. Or he has earned this name over time and just rolled with it.
It'd be like if you introduced him as "my buddy Blockhead," and he'd say, "Sup?" You'd have guesses on what this dude's like. That's what's happening here: his name's Fool.
Then it tells us where we are. The woman, Abigail, was discerning and beautiful, but the man was harsh and badly behaved. So he's earned it; he's lived up to it. At least he was a Calebite, meaning he comes from a prominent family inside the tribe of Judah. David is also in the tribe of Judah, so they would have considered each other kin, more especially kin than just being of the people of Israel.
David heard in the wilderness that Nabal was shearing his sheep. So David sent ten young men, and David said to the young men:
> Go up to Carmel, and go to Nabal, and greet him in my name. And thus you shall greet him:
>
> Peace be to you, and peace be to your house, and peace be to all that you have.
>
> I hear that you have shearers.
>
> Now your shepherds have been with us, and we did them no harm, and they missed nothing all the time they were in Carmel.
>
> Ask your young men, and they will tell you.
>
> Therefore, let my young men find favor in your eyes, for we come on a feast day.
>
> Please give whatever you have at hand to your servants and to your son David.
David sends a ten-man delegation to say, "We hear you have shearers, which means it's a feast day. We've been with your shearers and shepherds. We've actually been part of the reason all your sheep are alive. If there's anything you could give us, that'd be great."
This can sound a little extortionary to us: "I helped you out, you owe me." Maybe a little of that is there, but they're of the same tribe. This is a normal thing to be hospitable and to expect hospitality. So what David has helped him, he's saying, "I'm part of the reason why this has gone so well for you this year, and we'd like to participate in this feast."
The next layer is that we're of the same tribe. They belong to each other. Another layer is you should just say yes to this anyway, no matter who shows up and asks because that's what the people of Israel are supposed to be like: hospitable and welcoming.
Well above our cultural pressures to be hospitable and welcoming, this is a normal cultural thing that you would say yes to.
It's a little bit like if someone says, "Hey, is there anything you could do? It would be really helpful. You know it is Christmas." Saying "It's Christmas" adds this "You should" kind of thing to it. But they should say yes all the time. At sheep shearing time, it's more festive and more hospitable; there are all kinds of layers to why Nabal should say yes to this. It's expected, it's good, it's what he ought to do.
Remember his name, right? Let's see how he acts.
Verse 9:
> When David's young men came, they said all this to Nabal in the name of David. And then they waited.
And Nabal answered:
> David's servants, who is David? Who is the son of Jesse? There are many servants these days who are breaking away from their masters. Shall I take my bread and my water and my meat that I have killed for my shearers and give it to the men who come from nowhere, whom I do not know?
That would be rude to us. It is wildly, excessively rude to them. You ever watch a Western? You know how there's a moment where one calls the other a liar, and everything gets tense? They stand up because you've called me a liar. Obviously, I have to shoot you now. That's the kind of thing happening.
Or in the play Hamilton, they've seen multiple duels in writing letters back and forth. You can tell these are fighting words, working toward a duel. Culturally, we don't have that anymore. We don't do duels anymore; that's probably good for us.
Every once in a while you meet someone and think, "I wish someone had hit them upside the head," but in general, culturally it's good that we turn the other cheek, that we're calmer, that we don't overreact or defend our honor in that way.
But what Nabal has done is aggressively, intentionally disregarded, dishonored, picked a fight with David in pride. He said, "Who is David? Who's the son of Jesse? You come from no one; you are worth nothing." He says there are many people who have broken away from their masters and are roaming around the woods these days. You want me to feed all of them? Like, no.
This is very aggressive.
They go back to David. Let's see how David responds.
Verse 12:
> So David's young men turned away and came back and told him all this.
David said to his men:
> Every man, strap on his sword.
Every man strapped on his sword; David also strapped on his sword. About 400 men went up after David, while 200 remained with the baggage.
He leaves 200 and takes 400, saying, "Put your swords on. Let's go talk to Nabal ourselves."
Verse 14:
> But one of the young men told Abigail, Nabal's wife, "Behold, David sent messengers out of the wilderness to greet our master, and he railed at them. Yet the men were very good to us. We suffered no harm, and we did not miss anything when we were in the fields. As long as we went with them, they were a wall to us both by night and by day. All the while we were with them, keeping the sheep."
Now, therefore, know this and consider what you should do, for harm is determined against our master and against all his house. He is such a worthless man that one cannot speak to him.
There’s a handful of things going on here. Somebody watches this interaction and says, somebody go tell Abigail, somebody get Ma—she'll handle this. That's the assumption.
You can actually see the kind of respect and the position that she held in this household by the way they're responding. I don't know if your life has been like mine, but I've been wildly blessed by ladies like this who can handle things, who will sort stuff out, who, when something's going poorly, you say, "Yeah, go get them. Explain this to them. They'll step in, make this better, know what to do." That's the situation she's in: somebody goes to say, "Hey, real quick, Nabal was Nabling, and I need to talk to you about what just happened."
They explain it to her.
I also want to point out that they say, "You know what he's like. You can't talk to him. He is such a worthless man. No one can speak to him." I just want to tell you that you don't want that to ever be true for you. You don’t want people to say, "Well, you know what it’s like to talk to them? They don’t listen. They’re hard to talk to."
You want to actively fight that in yourself. When someone says, "Hey, I need to talk to you about something," you want to go, "Okay, this is my chance. Lord, help me. Don't get defensive. Help me listen," because that's a bad spot to be in.
They say he was very rude to them, and they've been great. David was great to us. It was great to be with David. We didn't worry about anything. As long as we were with them, there was nothing to worry about. They helped us; they protected us; they defended us.
Not only should he probably not respond that way to anybody, but he certainly should be good to these guys because they’ve been very good to us. That's the situation they're saying to him.
Verse 18:
> Then Abigail made haste and took 200 loaves and two skins of wine and five sheep already prepared, and five seahs of parched grain, and a hundred clusters of raisins and 200 cakes of figs, and laid them on donkeys.
That's a lot of food just ready to go.
She starts piling this on donkeys: 200 loaves, five sheep already prepared, 200 cakes of figs. He’s very rich.
We’ll find out later it’s not like she went and cleaned out buffets. They don’t even notice this stuff is gone. Not only should he have said yes, he actually had the ability to say yes and not even notice it. So he’s got all this ready to go at the moment. It's unnoticed.
She puts it on donkeys.
Verse 19:
> She said to her young men, "Go on before me; behold, I come after you."
But she did not tell her husband Nabal.
As she rode on the donkey and came down under the cover of the mountain, behold, David and his men came down toward her. She met them.
David had said:
> Surely in vain have I guarded all that this fellow has in the wilderness, so that nothing was missed of all that belonged to him. And he has returned me evil for good.
>
> God do so to the enemies of David, and more also, if by morning I leave so much as one male of all who belong to him.
David’s plan as he’s traveling is, when we get there, we’re going to kill every man. David says to himself that it was a huge waste of time that he defended his sheep.
If you lived in a modest home backed up to somebody's massive acreage and could see all the wealth they had, and at some point their fence broke and their little yappy dog got out, you helped catch the dog and fixed the fence. Then later, you go around and say, "Hey, you wouldn't happen to have any eggs?" and they say, "I can't be giving handouts to people who can’t afford eggs." What does that look like? Charity? "Get off my lawn before I call the police."
You might go back to your house and think, "I'm going to break their fence and steal their dog." Originally, you weren't doing it because you knew one day you were going to need something, but there might be something in you that goes, "That was a waste of time. This guy's such a jerk. He doesn't deserve any good thing I’ve ever done for him."
You might just be losing it in your backyard.
That’s a little bit of what’s happening with David here. He's responded violently and is saying to himself, everything that I did that was good was a waste of time. He’s decided he’s going to kill everybody.
He gives an interesting curse—we’ve seen several curses in First Samuel. This is one of the better ones because of how he words it. Most curses we’ve seen have followed a pattern: "May the Lord do so and more also to me if I don’t blank to them." But David says:
> May the Lord do so and more also to my enemies if I don't kill all of them.
A double outward-facing curse. It seems like a better way to word it. If I don’t kill them, may the Lord kill them. He just puts it out that way; he doesn’t bind himself in a curse.
His plan is to go kill everybody.
I want you to hear this clearly: David is wrong. Don’t read your Bible and think this is one of the good guys. Not everything he does is good. The Lord is good, and what he does is good. You can see what he’s doing and say that’s good (Jesus is good). The Bible isn’t about good people and bad people; it’s about bad people and Jesus.
You see Jesus at work; you can say, "This must be good," but you can’t do that with anybody else.
What David is about to do is wrong; he’s going to defend his pride through massacre. Nobody talks to David like that; that’s where he’s at.
But who just met him? Abigail.
David’s coming with 400 men, all with swords strapped on. They don’t look pleasant; they’re on their way to harm people. She comes to talk to them.
What she’s about to do is insanely courageous.
You know how you have things you’re afraid of? Meeting new people, large crowds, public speaking, facing down an army, possibly being murdered, conflict. She’s about to do all those, and handle them extremely well.
When you look at Proverbs 31, which talks about what a woman should look like—a wife should look like—Abigail is Proverbs 31 on display: using intelligence, ability, wisdom for the good of those around her.
She could have avoided this situation. She knew something bad was coming. She could have left; it would have affected her household. But she was involved.
She jumps right in the middle for Nabal’s sake and for David’s sake. She sees two foolish men. She actually knew that something bad was going to happen.
As soon as she heard the situation, she said David's on the move. She was right. She said, "I don’t think you can talk stuff to David like that without there being a lot of bad things that happen next."
She’s right.
She’s going to intercept David and Nabal, jump in the middle of them and this brokenness where pride, arrogance, anger are about to slam into each other.
Suddenly there’s Abigail on a donkey, about to give the largest speech of any woman in the Old Testament. She’s going to share wisdom, clarity, humility, faith.
This is what she says.
Verse 23:
> When Abigail saw David, she hurried and got down from the donkey and fell before David on her face and bowed to the ground.
She begins with a very humble posture. She shows up, bows to the ground. It does not tell us if she gets up. It's possible she continues speaking from that posture or maybe stands.
Verse 24:
> She fell at his feet and said,
>
> On me alone, my lord, be the guilt.
>
> Please let your servant speak in your ears and hear the words of your servant.
>
> Let not, my lord, regard this worthless fellow Nabal, for as his name is, so is he. Nabal is his name, and folly is with him.
Quick pause: I don’t believe this gives wives license to speak however they want about their husbands, even their foolish husbands. Which I know is a follow-up question.
Put your hand down.
But if you are negotiating good for his entire household and trying to save his life, I think the rules get looser than when you’re at book club with your friends. She doesn’t speak in a very honoring way of her husband. He has actively done dumb things. She is trying for the sake of their household to bring good.
She’s trying to bring blessing to him, even though he’s acted like that.
But this isn’t how I think you’re allowed to talk about them all the time.
Even if she did, you still shouldn’t.
She starts off by saying we don’t want Nabal representing her house. This is on me.
Don’t let him lead you into this. That’s what she’s saying.
She continues:
> But I, your servant, did not see the young men of my lord whom you sent. Please forgive me. This is on me. If I had seen him, we wouldn’t have this problem.
Verse 26:
> Now then, my lord, as the Lord lives and as your soul lives, because the Lord has restrained you from blood guilt and from saving with your own hand, now then, let your enemies and those who seek to do evil to my lord be as Nabal.
She says it’s so good the Lord restrained him from blood guilt. She assumes graciously and boldly that he’s going to stop. The Lord has intercepted him to keep him from doing something foolish.
She doesn’t say "foolish," but it’s baked in.
The fool was about to create folly, and she’s thankful the Lord helped stop it.
Then:
> May the Lord make all of your enemies like Nabal—not dead, but foolish. Let them act foolish, but don’t let you act foolish.
Verse 27:
> And now let this present that your servant has brought to my lord be given to the young men who follow my lord. Please forgive the trespass of your servant, for the Lord will certainly make my lord a sure house, because my lord is fighting the battles of the Lord, and evil shall not be found in you so long as you live.
> If men rise up to pursue you and seek your life, the life of my lord shall be bound in the bundle of the living in the care of the Lord your God, and the lives of your enemies shall he sling out as from the hollow of a sling.
She’s wise in words, uses sling metaphors for David. He gets it immediately.
She brings blessing. She shows up in the middle of sin, takes guilt, and brings blessing.
She brings physical blessing and then verbally blesses him. She says, “Take this gift,” and then she blesses David, his house, family, future.
Verse 30:
> When the Lord has done to my lord according to all the good that he has spoken concerning you and has appointed you prince over Israel...
It seems known that David has been anointed and that he's going to be king; that has spread at least to the people in Judah.
Verse 31:
> My lord shall have no cause of grief or pangs of conscience for having shed blood without cause, or for my lord working salvation for himself.
> When the Lord has dealt well with my lord, then remember your servant.
She says when she shows up, "I’m glad the Lord let me intercept you to keep you from blood guilt." She ends with, when he makes you king, you won’t feel bad about this. You won’t have pangs of conscience that you tried to save yourself or shed blood without cause.
It’s wise, clear, corrective, humble.
Verse 32:
> David said to Abigail,
>
> "Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who sent you this day to meet me.
>
> Blessed be your discretion, and blessed be you who have kept me this day from blood guilt and from working salvation with my own hand.
>
> For as surely as the Lord, the God of Israel lives, who has restrained me from hurting you, unless you had hurried and come to meet me, truly by morning there had not been left in Nabal so much as one male."
David erupts in worship:
Oh, thank the Lord! Blessed be the Lord! Blessed be your discretion! Blessed be you that you came because I was about to do something so foolish!
Y'all, may we respond like David when we’re corrected. May we love the people who correct us.
Culturally, we celebrate, "I want my friends to match my energy." Like, if I’m amped up, I want you to get amped up with me.
I saw a clip from a movie: a guy comes in, looks at his friend, says, "Hey, you can’t ask me questions; I need you to come with me. We’re going to hurt some people. We can never talk about this again." His friend looks at him and says, "Are you driving, or am I driving?"
Culturally, we say, "Yay! Best friends! Secret murders!"
That’s what we want. We want friends who ride or die. We want you to hop in the car if I say, "Let’s go."
Reality is, no. You need some calm, patient, wet blanket friends. Some people who say, "Why aren’t you mad?"
You need people who have wisdom, discretion, who slow you down, love you enough to risk a relationship by correcting you.
I’m not talking about argumentative, contrary people. I’m talking about people who love you enough to say, "Hey, we need to talk because what you’re doing is unwise, unhelpful, foolish, sinful."
We want to learn to be people who say, "Praise Jesus that you listened to the Spirit when I didn’t! Thank you, Lord, that you sent them to be around me."
You’re doing things over your life that are unwise. You’re doing things that aren’t good. You’re sinning.
The last time you were corrected is maybe the last time someone showed you genuine love.
If you go long seasons without correction, you need to begin to work on how you respond to correction and the type of people you surround yourself with.
May we be people like Abigail who love people enough to say something. She jumped in the middle, could have left, but she was involved.
Verse 35:
> Then David received from her hand what she had brought him.
>
> He said to her, "Go up in peace to your house. See, I have obeyed your voice and granted your petition."
Abigail came to Nabal, and behold, he was holding a feast in his house like the feast of a king.
Nabal’s heart was merry within him; he was very drunk.
She told him nothing at all until morning.
Verse 37:
> In the morning, when the wine had gone out of Nabal, his wife told him these things.
>
> His heart died within him, and he became as a stone.
>
> About ten days later, the Lord struck Nabal, and he died.
She went and explained: you said this, I did this, I met David with 400 men coming to kill everybody, the gift I gave him.
He locks up; something happens to his heart, his body. He dies ten days later.
Verse 39:
> When David heard that Nabal was dead,
>
> He said, "Blessed be the Lord, who has avenged the insult I received at the hand of Nabal and kept back his servant from wrongdoing.
>
> The Lord has returned the evil of Nabal on his own head."
This principle runs throughout Scripture: we aren't meant to get vengeance ourselves. We're to trust the Lord that He will respond, will care for us, and this is not to be taken into our hands.
We are to say, "Lord, I will bear insult, trusting you’ll bring about good."
That’s how David responds when he hears that: "Thank you, Lord, for letting his wickedness fall back on him and not on me."
"For me not getting involved, me not doing wrongdoing, You kept me back from him."
Verse 40:
> Then David sent and spoke to Abigail to take her as his wife.
When the servants of David came to Abigail at Carmel, they said to her:
> David has sent us to you to take you to him as his wife.
She rose and bowed with her face to the ground, saying:
> "Behold, your handmaid is a servant to wash the feet of the servants of my lord."
Abigail hurried, rose, mounted a donkey, and her five young women attended her.
She followed the messengers of David and became his wife.
First of all, she has little notes: she has the largest lady entourage of anybody in Scripture.
She’s wealthy and well attended to. She humbly accepts this. She even responds, "I’ll just be a servant." I think she knows she’s going to get married, but she humbly says, "I’ll be a servant." She’s gracious.
The story begins with David sending men to say, "Hey, Nabal, can we have some food from your feast?"
It ends with him going and getting Nabal’s wife.
It’s a wild story.
One thing is when David’s corrected by Abigail, he loves her for it; he responds.
I want to read the last of this chapter before considering a few things:
Verse 42:
> So she became his wife.
David also took Ahinoam of Jezreel, and both of them became his wives.
Saul had given Michal, his daughter, David’s wife, to Palti, son of Laish, who was of Gallim.
Personally, I wish that note was somewhere else, because it feels like you see this interesting little love story play out, and at the end they’re getting married, but then there’s another lady also, and you’re like, "Wait, what?"
Historically, men in power had multiple wives.
We see David wrongfully, angrily respond to a thing. We see him begin to take multiple wives.
He’s not handling everything well.
One of the things for kings is they wouldn’t have too many wives. He’s not even a king yet; he’s just roaming the woods.
He already has two and a half because we’re not exactly sure what’s going on with Michal. She’s married to someone else but also married to him.
We’ll see how that plays out.
That’s the situation.
Looking back, consider something beautiful in this text.
Abigail rides in to intercept in the middle before things go wildly wrong.
David loves her for it.
He walks under the shadow of the mountain, ready to murder.
He leaves praising the Lord.
His heart is softened at her correction.
Nabal is hardened at her correction. He turns to stone, and it kills him.
We have softening and love, and death born out of the same action.
This reality is how Jesus comes to us.
He intercepts us in our sin.
He comes to correct us, call us away from sin, stepping into situations He didn’t have to but does because He loves us and wants to rescue and bring blessing.
He steps in to take guilt on Himself, saying, "Let the guilt fall on me."
All who hear this message will either, like David, soften and love Him or will harden and say, "Who does He think He is? Why do I have to worship Him? Why do I have to follow Him? What does He mean He died for my sin? What is sin? He made the rules. Why would I have to?"
You will twist on it.
There’s a way to respond that brings life, blessing, joy, hope.
There’s a way that hardens you up.
If you belong to Jesus, your heart ought to be very soft to Him and His correction.
You ought to see with joy the love He shows when He corrects.
You ought to be soft in correction to those around you who say, "I think you're wrong about this."
You ought to say, "Thank you for loving me."
Try to listen as best you can, understand what they're saying, sort it out, be patient.
Praise the Lord for people who will correct you.
None of us want to harden ourselves against Jesus or His people so we might work closer to death, locking ourselves into stone so we can’t hear His voice or listen.
Let’s pray.
God, may You in Your grace let us be soft and receptive.
May we be receptive to Your Spirit when You call us to repentance.
May we be receptive to the people in our church family and those around us who know us and love us and love You who correct us.
May it be a delight to our soul as David was blessed and continued to bless Your name for turning him away from wrongdoing.
Lord, may we love the people in our church and those close to us enough to correct them.
I pray in Jesus’ name and by Your Spirit’s work, for those who have hardened themselves against Your calls to repentance, may You not let them do it.
May You not let them harden their heart or turn to stone so they cannot hear Your voice or listen to Your people.
May You intercept them by Your grace even now.
May they hear and repent.
We ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen.
As a church, we are going to take communion together.
I’d like to read from Luke chapter 22.
This is Jesus on the night He was betrayed, at the last supper with His disciples.
Luke 22:19 says:
> And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying,
>
> "This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me."
When we take communion together, we take a loaf and remember that Jesus' body was broken for us.
Our hope is not that we would suffer and die for ourselves, atone for our sin, but that He has.
We share in one loaf, and when we do this together, we remind ourselves and each other that our one hope is Jesus and Jesus alone.
And then likewise the cup:
> "This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood."
This hope is made sure because it is covenanted with us through the blood of Christ, sealed through His work.
If you have trusted Christ, we take communion as a remembrance of this moment and the covenant made with us.
We take it in hope of the day coming when all things are restored and made new, forgiven fully and made free.
If you have not placed your faith in Jesus, this is not for you.
We say Christ is for you. His offer of salvation is for you. Repentance is for you.
But we ask you not to take communion until you understand fully what you’re celebrating.
For those who’ve placed faith in Jesus, take a moment, listen to the Spirit.
If there’s somewhere you need to repent, if there’s someone you need to talk to, do that, then come joyfully.
Remind your soul your sin has been paid for, and your hope is held sure because of Christ’s work.
If you have a gluten allergy, we have gluten-free back there.
1 Samuel 23-24
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. We'll continue to walk through First Samuel. We're going to be in chapter 23 and 24 today, so you'll walk through those two chapters together.
In high school I played baseball and my freshman year we won state. Going into sophomore year, our senior class was kind of a little bit big headed. Before the season started, you had to pass a conditioning test called the country mile. It's about a four and a half mile run. Our seniors decided that because of where our coach was positioned—he parked his truck and the school was out in the country—it just was a run where you're running down that stop sign and back and around the school near the cow field. They realized that he didn't have visibility in every part of the run, so they thought, we're going to take some shortcuts. We're not going to run the full four and a half miles. We're going to shortcut here, here, and here.
When you're 15, 16, 17, you're dumb; you're not thinking through things. We thought we were because we thought, here's what we'll do. We'll all bunch up together here and we'll release here. We had a guy on our team who was about 300 pounds, so we didn't think through that he needed to be way back and finish way late. Our coach picked up pretty quickly that we were cheating. He saw the times and said this is very curious that the biggest guy on our team is running a seven and a half minute mile pace.
They finally said, all right, you guys have been running so well and doing so good. Like a cross country team, I've got your times, and that's the time you have to pass in order to make it on the baseball field. If you pass it, you go straight to the baseball field, but twice a week you have to make this run and then go to the field. He said, all right, now it's time to do it. Here are your times. We positioned all the coaches at every part of the run to see how good you were.
We quickly learned that cutting this race short and taking the shortcuts was a terrible decision. For weeks as we tried to make those times, I was one of the faster guys. It was like 28 minutes. I'm not a cross country runner; I'm not going to make close to six-minute pace for four and a half miles. I'll finish that story later and what happened. But I learned there, and I think we learn in life, that shortcuts are not good. They are short-sighted. We take them because we think that's ultimately what is good, that if we take the quickest route to get what we want, that's what's best. It's our own nature to trust in our own instincts and to actually not trust in the Lord, when oftentimes He lays out the more difficult road, a difficult path filled with suffering and difficult obedience.
Today we're in the part of David's story that feels, when you're in chapter 23, that for years he's been on the run for his life and he's been through trials and suffering and betrayal and the threat of death. He's been in it. But when we shift into chapter 24, he's going to have an option, a shortcut to the throne. We're going to see how this plays out and what this means for the Christian life as we consider what it means to have a long life of obedience to our Lord, even when it is difficult.
Let me pray, and then we'll walk through this together.
Heavenly Father, I pray that You would help us receive Your word as we walk through these chapters to see Your truth. God, I pray that we would not just be hearers of the Word, but doers of the Word, responding in faith and repentance and ultimately delighting in You above all things. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.
All right, so verse 1:
"Now they told David, Behold, the Philistines are fighting against Keilah and are robbing the threshing floors."
We pick up where we left off last week, where David and his men are on the run. They just heard about the priest of Nob being slaughtered for proceeding to help them out. They're feeling the threat of death. At this point, they hear of a town called Keilah, a town in Judah on the border between Philistine's land and the people of Judah, and they're being robbed by the Philistines.
Verse 2:
"Therefore David inquired of the Lord, Shall I go and attack these Philistines? And the Lord said to David, Go and attack the Philistines and save Keilah."
David gives us an example here of what it looks like to walk with God. He sees a difficulty. He asks the Lord. The Lord responds, and he's willing to do it. But his men hear this and have questions.
Verse 3:
"But David's men said to him, Behold, we are afraid here in Judah. How much more then if we go to Keilah against the armies of the Philistines?"
Which is a legitimate question, because if they go into Keilah, they expose themselves. They've been hiding in caves throughout the land. To go and help this town, chances are Saul will hear about it and come. It might be a situation where they're fighting the Philistines and Saul’s army is coming. This seems risky.
So David goes back to the Lord.
Verse 4:
"Then David inquired of the Lord again, and the Lord answered him, Arise, go down to Keilah, for I will give the Philistines into your hand."
David and his men went to Keilah, fought the Philistines, brought away their livestock, and struck them a great blow. David saved the inhabitants of Keilah.
Verse 6:
"When Abiathar the son of Ahimelech had fled to David at Keilah, he had come down with an ephod in hand."
Abiathar was the remaining priest from the priest of Nob story last week. He comes and brings an ephod. Ephods are priestly garments that priests wore, but this is probably the main ephod that the high priest wore. This is important because in it were two stones—the Urim stone and the Thummim stone. We don't know for sure how they were used, but they generally helped answer prayers in a yes or no fashion, like, should we go here or there? The priest did some type of pulling out or casting of stones.
Verse 7:
"Now, it was told Saul that David had come to Keilah, and Saul said, God has given him into my hand, for he has shut himself in by entering a town that has gates and bars."
Saul finally hears about it and says, aha, I’ve got them. They're in Keilah, a place with gates and bars. We'll stop the men there and finally take David down.
Verse 8:
"Saul summoned all the people to go to war, to go down to Keilah to besiege David and his men. David knew that Saul was plotting harm against him."
He says to Abiathar the priest, bring the ephod here.
Verse 9:
"Then David said, O Lord, the God of Israel, your servant has surely heard that Saul seeks to come to Keilah to destroy the city on my account. Will the men of Keilah surrender me into his hand? Will Saul come down, as your servant has heard, O Lord, God of Israel, please tell your servant."
They seek the Lord, asking if the city will betray them after David’s protection.
Verse 11:
"And the Lord said, He will come down. Then David said, Will the men of Keilah surrender me and my men into the hand of Saul? And the Lord said, They will surrender you."
David and his men, about 600 now, arose and departed from Keilah and went wherever they could go. They asked the question, should we trust Keilah? The answer was no, as you see from the Lord's response.
When Saul was told that David escaped Keilah, he gave up the expedition. David remained in the strongholds in the wilderness, in the hill country of the wilderness of Ziph. Saul sought him every day, but God did not give him into his hand.
David saw that Saul had come to seek his life. David was in the wilderness of Ziph at Horesh. Jonathan, Saul's son, rose and went to David at Horesh and strengthened his hand. He said:
"Do not fear for the hand of Saul. My father shall not find you. You shall be king over Israel, and I shall be next to you."
Saul, my father, also knows this. The two of them made a covenant before the Lord. David remained at Horesh and Jonathan went home.
Jonathan, David's friend, hears about these troubles and encourages him. From Psalm 34, which was written while David was in the cave fearing his life, we know the Lord is near the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. David, on the run for his life with deep discouragement, has this friend encouraging him.
This encounter is significant because Jonathan has hopefulness. He says, one day you’ll be king, and I’ll be beside you. This foreshadows that Jonathan will never see David be king; he will not live to see him on the throne. This is their final encounter. Jonathan, in his last friendship act, encourages David, telling him not to fear and to trust God's promises.
Verse 19:
"Then the Ziphites went up to Saul at Gibeah saying, Is not David hiding among us in the strongholds at Horesh, on the hill of Akilah, which is south of Jeshimon? Now come down, O king, according to all your heart’s desire to come down, and our part shall be to surrender him into the king’s hand."
Saul said:
"May you be blessed by the Lord for you have had compassion on me. Go make yet more sure. Know and see the place where his foot is and who has seen him there, for he is very cunning. See and take note of all the lurking places where he hides, and come back to me with sure information."
They went ahead to Ziph as spies.
If you read Psalm 54, David expresses his distress at this betrayal by his own countrymen:
"For strangers have risen up against me; ruthless men seek my life; they do not set God before themselves."
David is deeply discouraged by continual betrayal, even from people of Judah.
David and his men were in the wilderness of Maon, about five miles south of Ziphara in the Arabah. Saul and his men went to seek him. David went down to the rock and lived in the wilderness of Maon. When Saul heard that, he pursued David there. Saul went on one side of the mountain and David and his men on the other side.
David was hurrying to get away from Saul, who was closing in to capture them.
A messenger then told Saul:
"Hurry and come, for the Philistines have made a raid against the land."
Saul returned from pursuing David and went against the Philistines. Therefore that place was called the Rock of Escape. David then lived in the strongholds of En Gedi.
At the last moment when Saul was about to capture David, God sovereignly intervened. Saul did what a king should do and protected his people, and God preserved David’s life again.
Chapter 23 gives us more examples of David continually facing the threat of death and betrayal. Think—he escaped death at Nob, at Ziph, at Maon, at Gath, and at Keilah. This is years of hunting, suffering, and fear. Every time trying to go to sleep, hearing a branch break, wondering, is it the day? Years of hardship and trauma under the threat of constant death.
This sets up First Samuel 24, where David has the opportunity to end it.
Verse 1:
"When Saul returned from following the Philistines, he was told, Behold, David is in the wilderness of En Gedi. Then Saul took 3,000 chosen men out of Israel and went to seek David and his men in front of the Wild Goats Rocks."
Saul handles the Philistine raid, then he finds that David is near Wild Goats Rocks, basically a rocky hill where wild goats live.
The story takes an interesting turn.
Verse 3:
"He came to the sheepfolds, where there was a cave. Saul went in to relieve himself. David and his men were sitting in the innermost parts of the cave."
Saul goes into the cave to use the bathroom, for privacy. David and 600 of his men are hiding inside that cave, which hopefully gives you an idea of how big it was.
David’s men were very excited because Saul was most vulnerable now, when using the bathroom. This was a moment on a silver platter—David and his men could have ended all the hardship with one swing of the sword.
Verse 4:
"And the men of David said to him, Here is the day of which the Lord said to you, Behold, I will give your enemy into your hand, and you shall do to him as it shall seem good to you."
They urged David to take this opportunity.
David rose stealthily and cut off a corner of Saul's robe. He could have ended it all but instead cut a piece of his robe.
Verse 5:
"And afterward David's heart struck him because he had cut off a corner of Saul's robe. He said to his men, The Lord forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the Lord's anointed, to put out my hand against him, seeing he is the Lord's anointed."
David persuaded his men not to attack Saul.
Saul rose and left the cave, going on his way.
David knew God’s heart and the heart of the king. Saul was the Lord's anointed king, even if evil had been done. David would not decide when Saul’s kingship ends. He trusted the Lord and obeyed, not murdering a man while he was vulnerable.
His men, who have been under the threat of death for years, followed his example. That shows David's leadership.
After Saul left the cave, David boldly confronted him.
Verse 8:
"David arose and went out of the cave and called after Saul, My lord the king."
Saul looked back. David bowed with his face to the earth and paid homage.
David said:
"Why do you listen to the words of men who say, Behold, David seeks your harm? Behold this day your eyes have seen how the Lord gave you today into my hand in the cave. Some told me to kill you, but I spared you. I said, I will not put out my hand against the Lord, for he is the Lord's anointed."
David pleaded:
"See, my father, see the corner of your robe in my hand. I cut off the corner and did not kill you. You may know and see that there is no wrong or treason in my hands. I have not sinned against you, though you hunt my life to take it."
He called out:
"May the Lord judge between me and you. May the Lord avenge me against you, but my hand shall not be against you."
He even said:
"Out of the wicked comes wickedness, but my hand shall not be against you. After whom has the king of Israel come out? After a dead dog, after a flea? May the Lord therefore be judge and give sentence between me and you, and see to it and plead my cause and deliver me from your hand."
David showed that he would not sin to get what God promised. He humbly lowered himself to be insignificant—a dead dog, a flea—and pleaded with Saul to see that he was not the enemy.
Verse 16:
"As soon as David had finished speaking these words to Saul, Saul said, Is this your voice, my son David? Saul lifted up his voice and wept. He said, You are more righteous than I, for you repaid me good, whereas I have repaid you evil. You have declared this day how you have dealt well with me and that you did not kill me when the Lord put me into your hands."
Saul has moments of clarity and contrition. He weeps and realizes David is the better man.
There's a cool link to Judah and Tamar back in Genesis 38, a picture of having evidence in hand and declaring righteousness.
Saul continued:
"Now behold, I know that you shall surely be king, that the kingdom of Israel shall be established in your hands. Swear to me by the Lord that you will not cut off my offspring after me, and that you will not destroy my name out of my father's house."
David swore to this.
Saul went home; David and his men went up to the stronghold.
Saul finally sees it: David will be king. He pleads for the protection of his offspring, as it was common in history for successors to kill rival family members.
When you think about chapters 23 and 24 back to back, you see how long David suffered and how many years of hardships he endured. He had the opportunity right then to end all his hardships with one swing of the sword and take the throne. But he did not. He trusted the Lord and was obedient to the will of the Father.
This is a beautiful picture of trust in God.
It's also a foreshadowing of the more righteous path of Christ.
Jesus also would be offered a shortcut to the throne during His temptation in the wilderness.
In Matthew 4:
"The devil took Him to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. He said to Him, All these I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.
Then Jesus said to him, Begone, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve."
Jesus was offered the throne but rejected the shortcut because He trusted the will of the Father, even when that road was filled with suffering—the road to the cross.
Jesus suffered agony, physical pain, separation from the Father as the full cup of God's wrath bore down on Him.
Even when Jesus was suffering, He could have called down angels to end it, but He did not.
He endured to the final breath, with redemption in mind for us.
When He finished His work on the cross, He ascended to the right hand of God, where He rules over all kingdoms forever.
Amen.
Going back to 10th grade, when we were running this unreasonable time every day before practice, it was clear we were never going to make our times.
Finally, our coach said, all right, I’m going to bump up the time to what it should have been.
You smaller guys got 32 minutes, which was a pretty steady pace.
I hate running. To this day you won’t see me running; I’m not a runner. I don’t want to be a runner.
Because I hated running so much, I was determined to make the time. I ran faster than I ever had in my life. I was blazing fast.
Coming around the final turn, about a quarter of a mile left, my coach said, you’re not going to make it.
I sprinted, after running four-ish miles, with everything I had.
The final few steps before the finish line, I puked. Then I puked walking across the finish line because I was not going to miss this time.
He said 29 minutes.
I was like, are you kidding me? I could have walked.
What we failed to see about this conditioning test was we could only see what was right in front of us—a stupid run we had to do.
You may think, why do baseball players have to run? It’s because of endurance for the season.
When you play 30 games in high school, 60 plus in college, or 162 in pro baseball, you have to get in shape, or your body will break down mid-season.
At 15, you don’t see what the coach is doing. You don’t see that the suffering he puts you through over and over again is for a greater good, so you can make it through the season and not break down.
We didn’t trust our coaches. We saw what was good in our minds, so we took the shortcut.
But that’s what we do all the time in life. We see the easier option right in front of us and want to take it.
We have wonderful examples from Scripture about what it looks like to be obedient and how good that is.
David could have taken a shortcut to the throne, but didn’t.
Jesus was obedient to the Father, even through suffering, for our redemption.
We have wonderful examples of the long road of obedience, even when it’s difficult.
So the question today: What shortcuts are we tempted to take?
In business or work, we know shortcuts: how to cut corners, how to cheat.
We see others do it and wonder why we have to do it the right way.
But God calls us to integrity and obedience for our good.
In relationships, it’s common now to simulate marriage without the covenant.
Living as if married, moving in together, enjoying pleasures without commitment.
It’s hard to be obedient in that and honor the Lord.
But God has good for us when we trust Him in obedience.
We fail to see that when we take shortcuts.
Some feel a desire for vengeance when they've been wronged.
Shortcut is to take vengeance ourselves.
God calls us to trust Him for justice, which is far better.
In parenting, there are shortcuts.
Moments needing patience, control of emotions.
Shortcut is to lose control or discipline wrongly.
In marriage, conflict, and other struggles, shortcuts abound.
We often coach people to confront, to avoid gossip, to be faithful to God’s calls.
Some suffer deeply and may see shortcuts like substances, self-harm, or worse.
We cannot see the long obedience God calls us to.
As you consider today, what shortcut options are you taking when God calls you to obedience?
My hope is we consider David’s actions and the better David, Jesus Christ, and follow their lead.
Matt will come up and lead us in one final song.
As he comes, don’t shift or move, just listen.
The wrong response to the call is to say, "I’m going to do this by my strength," trying to muscle obedience.
The response is to look to Jesus.
Hebrews 12 says this after chapter 11:
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race set before us,
looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God."
Our example is to look to Christ, put our hope in Him, who endured the cross and now rules from heaven.
May we first look to Christ by grace through faith and be people who trust God every step in obedience.
Let me pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray that You would help us hear the good news of the Gospel that calls us to trust You, so that we might not take the shortcuts in life that do not bring joy, honor You, or bring good to us or those around us.
God, I pray for faithfulness, but that it comes by first trusting in You.
We have failed, sinned, and chosen shortcuts.
May You cover us in grace, by Your grace, through the blood of Jesus shed for us.
May we leave here as a people obedient to You, even when it is hard.
In Jesus' name, Amen.
1 Samuel 21-22
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning, my name's Chet, I'm one of the pastors here. If you will grab your Bible and go to First Samuel, chapter 21. We're going to be in chapters 21 and 22 today. We're looking through both of those chapters.
When I was growing up, probably three to five, I think I watched Mary Poppins 42,000 times. I'm pretty sure that we only had like a handful of VHS that my grandmother had recorded from her television. So I also have a lot of commercials really, really memorized. But I watched that on a regular basis. And there's this scene towards the end of the movie where the children had been in a bank and there was some bank trouble. And I don't want to get into a whole discussion of finance, but they had to run out of the bank and they get lost in London. And thus begins a series of back to back to back to back moments that were utterly terrifying to me.
It was like they took all the vulnerabilities of a four year old and just pummeled them. So they're lost in a city. Terrifying. Just not knowing where your parents are for like 12 seconds when you're four and five is scary. They're running through a city. This is, you know, it's awful. Then they come around a corner in an alleyway and an old lady pops out and goes, come with me, children. And it's like, why would she do that? And you don't know if she was intending to be helpful. They run away. She seemed scary. So they take off. Then they come around a corner and a dog jumps out and starts barking aggressively at them. When you're a child, a dog is the size of a bear. Like, I mean, you know. Then they turn and they run and they go down an alleyway and a shadowy figure grabs them. Turns out that that's their friend, but you don't know it at the time.
I just remember like this seared in my brain, this series of events. And I remember even as a little kid, like, I'm pretty sure there were times where I just stopped watching the movie before that I was like, well, let's move on. I know they make it at the. And I think there were other times where I just left the room and like waited till I heard the song start back up, you know, because it's a children's movie where things are supposed to be happy. And then I returned, but it was really this interesting peek into things that made me feel very vulnerable and very alone. And this real dive into fears that I had.
As we're reading through this text today, we're going to see how Saul, David and a handful of other people deal with fear. What it does to them, where it takes them. There's a reality to fear, that it drives us towards something, towards someone, it exposes us in a way. And so what I hope we see in this text is we're going to see them as they interact with it. They're going to see how they handle it. And what I hope we'll learn together is the scariest place to be and the safest place to be as we study this text together.
So let's pray quickly for us and then we'll move into chapter 21 of First Samuel. Lord, we ask for your help. We ask for your Spirit to speak in a way that we can understand, that you would help us to deal with our fears and to see what fear does to us in a way that draws us to you. In Jesus name, amen.
So David's on the run. Saul wants to kill him. Saul's the king. David was very close to Saul, was a general, was his bodyguard, was all these different things. And he's now having to flee for his life. And that's what we saw last week as Jonathan, Saul's son, helped David escape.
Chapter 21.
Then David came to Nob, to Ahimelech the priest. So he goes to Nob, and we're going to find out that Nob is a whole city of priests. It seems as if after everything, after Shiloh was destroyed and the ark was taken, they get the ark back, and it seems like now the center of the priesthood is here. It's unclear whether the ark is also here, but the priests are. And this is where priestly activities will be taking place for the people of Israel, the sacrifices and all that.
So he goes there to Ahimelech the priest. And Ahimelech came to meet David, trembling, and said to him,
"Why are you alone and no one with you?"
So it's odd for David to be by himself. Ahimelech knows David, but David usually has like a whole crew. He's either with the king, he's with his military units that he's overseeing. For David just to show up is what business does he have? Did something terrible happen? What's going on?
So he comes out, that's why he's trembling. And he says, what? What's going on? And David said to Ahimelech, the priest,
"The king has charged me with a matter and said to me, 'Let no one know anything of the matter about which I send you and with which I have charged you.' And I have made an appointment with the young men for such and such a place. Now then, what do you have on hand? Give me five loaves of bread or whatever is here."
So David just says, secret king business. And I've got some people that I'm definitely meeting who are real at a very specific place that you can't know about, and I need bread. None of that is true, except for that David wants bread, but he's on the run and he is just trying to get out of here.
And the priest answered, David,
"I have no common bread on hand, but there is holy bread if the young men have kept themselves from women,"
which just has to do with sexual activity, makes you unclean in the law. So that's what that is. It's not just like women, some mean thing about them. It just has to do with sexual activity.
David answered the priest,
"Truly, women have been kept from us. As always, when I go on an expedition, the vessels of the young men are holy, even when it is an ordinary journey. How much more today will their vessels be holy?"
So the priest gave him the holy bread, for there was no bread there, but the bread of the Presence which is removed from before the Lord to be replaced by hot bread on the day that it is taken away.
So the tabernacle seems to be here, the bread of the Presence is here. They would set it out on the Sabbath before the Lord as a picture of the meal, the connection, the communion that we have with the Lord, that they have with the Lord. And then they would rotate it out on the Sabbath. And the old loaves were allowed to be eaten by the priests. And Ahimelech breaks that rule to give to David in a time of need.
Jesus references this and says that he did right, that this was correct to do, to break a ceremonial law for the sake of caring for someone. And he says this in this argument with the Pharisees about the Sabbath, saying that some things were built for our good and our blessing, and therefore, if there's opposition, we can bless others in those moments. And that's what he's talking about.
So David takes that bread and he now has five loaves of bread that was the bread of the Presence, but the priest is allowing him to have it.
Verse 7.
Now, a certain man of the servants of Saul was there that day, detained before the Lord. His name was Doeg, the Edomite, the chief of Saul's herdsmen, he's detained before the Lord. It may be a Sabbath if they've just swapped the bread out. So it's possible he wasn't allowed to travel very long. It's also possible he's doing some sort of thing because he's an Edomite to become a follower of God. It's also possible that he has some sort of sickness or skin disease and he's having to be watched because there's all these. These are several of the reasons why you might be detained before the Lord. He could also just be there doing some, basically, some holy days for himself as he worships the Lord.
But that's it. That's all it tells us about him. It just in the middle of this story goes, hey, Doeg, the Edomite is here. And it's going to go right back to the story. And that's foreshadowing. So remember him, he'll show up later, but he doesn't do anything here.
Verse 8.
Then David said to Ahimelech,
"Then have you not here a spear or a sword at hand? For I have brought neither my sword nor my weapons with me because the king's business required haste."
And the priest said,
"The sword of Goliath, the Philistine, whom you struck down in the Valley of Elah. Behold, it is here wrapped in a cloth behind the Ephod, if you will. Take that, take it, for there's none but that here."
And David said,
"There is none like that. Give it to me."
So David says, I was in such a hurry, I don't even have any weapons. Do you have any weapons? He says, you gave us Goliath's sword. It's still here. And David says, great, that sword is awesome. I will take it. And so he has a nice, probably fairly large sword that he leaves with.
Verse 10.
And David rose and fled that day from Saul and went to Achish, the king of Gath.
Okay, David doesn't have any options. That's what this just told us. The plan that he's come up with is, I'm going to show up to Gath with Goliath of Gath's sword and see how that goes. It seems like he's intending to maybe be like a mercenary. He's just going to go there and serve there. He's absolutely on the run from his home, his people, his everything.
And the servants of Achish said to him, to Achish,
"Is not this David, the king of the land? Did they not sing to one another of him in dances? Saul has struck down his thousands and David his ten thousands."
So if David was planning on being undercover, he shows up and they're like, mmm. And they go to the king and they're like, I'm pretty sure they have a song about how good he is at murdering us. I'm pretty sure that's him.
And David took those words, these words to heart. So he somehow overheard this. In this situation, was much afraid of Achish, the king of Gath. So he changed his behavior before them, pretended to be insane in their hands and made marks on the doors of the gate and let his spittle run down his beard.
So somehow, on his way before the king, he just starts acting insane, drooling, marking up the walls. That's the best disguise he can come up with on the fly, you guys. And it works.
Then Achish said to his servants,
"Behold, you see, the man is mad. Why then have you brought him to me? Do I lack mad men that you've brought this fellow to behave as a madman in my presence? Shall this fellow come into my house?"
So they're like, hey, we've got David. And then he goes, you brought a crazy person here. Thank you so much. Did you think that was what I really needed? I needed those.
Some of y'all like to memorize verses for specific situations that you can remind, you know, rehearse yourself or say to other people. Maybe this one for, like, when your family's coming over for vacation or something, or your in-laws are coming and you can just quote to your spouse,
"Do we lack mad men in their house? Are we gonna let this fellow in just for y'all?"
Bible memorization, you're welcome. Probably won't be one of our monthly verses, but it's a good one.
All right, chapter 22.
David departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam.
So David then leaves. He heads back over into Israelite territory and hides in King Achish's. So his plan to go to Gath does not work and he escapes. Now, an interesting thing happens as we get to follow this story and as we have the whole revelation of the Scriptures, because this text doesn't tell us a lot of what's going on with David, what he's thinking. We just hear what he's doing. We hear some of what he says, but we don't get to see what's going on with him.
And so far, in the midst of fear, he's just run and he's come up with what arguably is an ill-advised plan to run to Gath. But that's all he comes up with. He ends up in this cave. But in the book of Psalms we have songs and poems and worship that David writes. And there's one that has this inscription above it. It says, this is Psalm 34. It says of David when he changed his behavior before Abimelech, so that he drove him out and he went away.
Now this text calls him Achish, which seems to be a title, and Abimelech seems to be his name. So like if you said he was in front of Caesar and then later it says Nero, it's the same guy. So Achish and Abimelech.
So we actually get to hear what, how David responds after this moment when he gets to escape. And so it seems like he wrote this while in the cave or on his way to it. He starts off in the first four verses, worshiping, praising. He says,
"I sought the Lord, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed. This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him and delivers them."
So he says, I had fear and he rescued me. And those who fear the Lord he protects. So David's interaction with fear is shifting here. He's saying, in my fear I began to go to the Lord, and now I fear him. He's the most fearful, so he's been on the run. It doesn't seem like he's handled everything so well so far. But now, as everything slows down, as he's trying to process through this, and he's worshiping the Lord for rescuing him out of Gath, this is what he's writing.
Verse 8,
"Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Oh, fear the Lord, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack."
He keeps going.
Verse 18,
"The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit."
In verse 22 he says,
"The Lord redeems the life of his servants. None of those who take refuge in him will be condemned."
This is how he ends it. So he says, I'm hiding in him. I'm taking refuge in him. My hope is in him. That's David as he deals with this fear.
So chapter 22, let's pick back up in the text.
David departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam. And when his brothers and all his father's house heard it, they went down there to him.
David on the run, hiding in a cave, trying to figure out what he's going to do, trying to lay low, writing some songs from his expert hiding place. He looks out one day, keeping a good lookout, and he's like, mom.
Because his whole family shows up. They all come to him, which makes sense. And maybe he had to go out for supplies. Maybe word spreads at some point where David is, but his whole family comes to him, which makes sense, because if David's on the run from Saul, they're probably not that safe from Saul. And Saul may go look to them to find David.
So they all go to David. Then it says this.
"And everyone who was in distress and everyone who was in debt and everyone who was bitter in soul gathered to him. And he became commander over them. And there were with him about 400 men."
So his mom, his brothers, his dad, they all show up. Then other people just start showing up. And it's like, why are you here? I am stressed beyond belief. Everything out there is terrible. I heard David was in a cave, and I thought, I'm gonna go get in that cave. Somebody else shows up. Why are you here? I owe so many people so much money. Cave started sounding pretty good. Everyone who's bitter in soul, so the most frustrated, angry people who are, they're not going to read, they're not going to vote for Saul when reelection time comes back around like, this hasn't worked for them. That's who's showing up to David. And then it says he becomes commander of them. So they showed up and they were like, everything is awful. And he's like, okay, do some push ups. It's time to start training. I guess y'all are gonna have to listen to what I say if you're hanging out in my cave. And they do. So now he has 400 distressed, bitter in soul people who owe a lot of money to other people. They're all with David now, plus his mom and his brothers and his dad, okay?
And David went from there to Mizpah of Moab. So now he leaves again. He takes all these people with him, it seems. And he said to the king of Moab,
"Please let my father and my mother stay with you till I know what God will do for me."
And he left them with the king of Moab, and they stayed with him all the time that David was in the stronghold.
So reading some commentaries on this, there was a couple of different ideas as to why the king of Moab would let him do that. Some of the things they put out were housing fugitives because the Moabites were enemies of the Israelites. So the king to house fugitives that are against Saul seems like maybe that's a good idea.
There's also just a general cultural thing of hospitality. So it's possible they're just doing what their culture does, which is show hospitality in these sort of situations.
There's a theory that it's possible that one of the reasons they went to Moab was that Jesse is the grandson of Ruth, who was from Moab. So there's some family connection here.
And I've come up with my own theory, which is that David showed up with 400 desperate men and said, hey, will you watch my mom? And they were like, sure. You and your friends gonna leave? He's like, we're gonna hang out a little bit, but just keep an eye on them until we figure out what's gonna happen.
So any one of those is possible as to why they've said yes to this, but they do say yes to this. David leaves his parents with the king of Moab, and he left them with the king of Moab, and they stayed with him all the time that David was in the stronghold.
Then the prophet Gad said to David,
"Do not remain in the stronghold. Depart and go into the land of Judah."
So he says, we're not going to stay in Moab. The Lord wants you to go back to Judah. And he does. And we're going to see Gad show up periodically through the story of David.
So David departed and went to the forest of Heref.
Now the story is going to shift to Saul. So we've seen David dealing with fear. We've seen him on the run, and we've seen him as this process is happening, growing in worship and saying, he's going to trust in the Lord.
And now we're going to see Saul as he deals with fear.
Verse 6.
Now, Saul heard that David was discovered and the men who were with him.
If you're playing hide and seek and someone finds you, you may not have had the best hiding spot. If your entire family finds you, plus 400 strangers, you don't have a good hiding spot.
So David now is discovered. They know he's out. They know kind of where he is. And he's got 400 people traveling around with him. And this news makes it to Saul. So he's no longer incognito. He's known.
Saul was sitting at Gibeah under the tamarisk tree on the height with his spear in his hand. And all his servants were standing about him, which first of all, of course he has a spear in his hand. He seems to always be holding a spear. But also what is happening in this text, it says he was sitting at Gibeah under the tamarisk tree on the height with his spear. And all his servants, all of those things are markers of leadership and kingship. That you would sit under an obvious tree, they would hold court there, they would answer questions there, they would judge there that he's on a height, that he's got servants, that he's holding his spear. So in some ways this text says Saul the king was out kinging in a very kingly way. That's kind of what that text is doing. It's building him up as much like he's super kinging. Right now. We got David hiding in a cave, wandering around other places, trying to figure out what he's going to do, hiding in a forest. And now we've got Saul, the kingiest king that ever did king.
And Saul said to his servants who stood about him here now,
"People of Benjamin."
Okay, that's interesting. Benjamin is the tribe that Saul is from. He's been king for a long time. He's been king over all of Israel for a long time. It's possible that he only always has kept just Benjaminites the closest to him. Or as he's grown more and more paranoid and more and more fearful, he's gotten rid of everybody who doesn't belong to his tribe and now has perfectly surrounded himself with Benjaminites. But either way, he's paranoid and fearful.
And we're going to hear from his speech how far that goes.
But these are only people from his clan. He's suspicious, fearful.
"Hear now, people of Benjamin, will the son of Jesse give every one of you fields and vineyards? Will he make you all commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds, that all of you have conspired against me?"
So he stands there and says, you just are so certain that David's gonna bless all of you, that he's gonna care for all of you, that you're all gonna be so important when he becomes king, that you've all conspired against me? And that's not true. But he now doubts everyone that's around him.
Still, in verse 8, he says,
"No one discloses to me when my son makes a covenant with the son of Jesse. None of you is sorry for me or discloses to me that my son has stirred up my servant against me to lie in wait, as at this day."
He is correct that Jonathan did make a covenant with David, but it was because they loved one another. It was a covenant of friendship to care for one another. They make a covenant that they're not going to harm each other. And Jonathan goes out of his way to keep his dad from sinning against David.
But he is not helping David lie in wait against Saul.
David isn't lying in wait against Saul. David's not out to get Saul. Saul's out to get David. Saul is actually not in danger, not from David, but he thinks he is. And he's saying, everyone's against me.
And Saul's entire world has shrunk to just him. It's just him. Everybody's an enemy. Everybody's in on it. Everything's a secret. Everything's falling apart.
Then answered Doeg, the Edomite, who stood by the servants of Saul,
"I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob to Ahimelech the son of Ahitub, and he inquired of the Lord for him and gave him provisions and gave him the sword of Goliath the Philistine."
We actually don't know if he inquired of the Lord from him. Our text doesn't tell us that. But Doeg says he did. But that's something you do before military stuff. He doesn't say he gave him five loaves of bread. He calls it provisions, just militarizing it up a little bit. And he gives him a sword. He basically says, hey, Ahimelech's in on it.
Then the king sent to summon Ahimelech the priest, the son of Ahitub and all his father's house. The priests who were at Nob and all of them came to the king. It would have taken a couple miles away, so to go get them to come back. This took a couple hours, but they all come.
And Saul said,
"Hear now, son of Ahitub?"
And he answered,
"Here I am, my lord."
And Saul said to him,
"Why have you conspired against me, you and the son of Jesse, in that you have given him bread and a sword and have inquired of God for him, so that he has risen against me to lie in wait as at this day?"
Then Ahimelech answered the king,
"And who among all your servants is as faithful as David, who is the king's son-in-law and captain over your bodyguard and honored in your house? Is today the first time that I have inquired of God for him? No. Let not the king impute anything to his servant or to all the house of my father, for your servant has known nothing of this, of all of this. Much or little."
So Ahimelech just says, it's David. David, your bodyguard, your son-in-law. I've done this. I do this. I would do this for him anytime he comes. I'm not in on something. I didn't know any of this. Don't add that to me. Don't add that to my family. That's not the case.
Aside from those noises, that's what he said. He may have said it really calmly, I don't know, but he just kind of lists out like five things in a row where he's just like, I didn't have anything to do with anything, and this is normal for me to do whatever David asks.
Verse 16.
And the king said,
"You shall surely die, Ahimelech. You and all your father's house."
And the king said to the guard who stood about him,
"Turn and kill the priests of the Lord, because their hand also is with David. They knew that he fled and did not disclose it to me."
But the servants of the king would not put out their hand to strike the priests of the Lord.
You got to hear the sentence that Saul said. He looks at his servants and says, that's it. Kill all the priests of the Lord because they're on David's team. Priests of the Lord. They're on David's team.
And then I don't know if y'all can see the fear and the frustration. And Saul's face turned purple as all of his soldiers are just like, nope, I'm not.
I love his soldiers in this moment because they all know there's going to be a day I stand before the Lord and it won't be Saul. There's a day that I will stand before my king and it isn't Saul. And I'm not going on record as killing a priest, it's not happening. You can kill me. That's fine. Then I'll go stand before the Lord and go, do you see me not kill that priest? Do you see what I just died for? Like, they just don't move.
And again, I'm sure this just confirms in Saul that everyone is against him. His whole world has shrunk down to his center of gravity and Doeg.
Then the king said to Doeg,
"You turn and strike down the priests."
And Doeg, the Edomite turned and struck down the priests. And he killed on that day 85 persons who wore the linen ephod. Doeg is an Edomite. He doesn't care.
So he kills them, 85 of them. They brought all the males from that household. They kill all of them. And Nob, the city of the priests, he put to the sword both man and woman, child and infant, ox, donkey and sheep. He put to the sword.
Saul does to the city of the priests what he was not willing to do to the Amalekites when it was for the Lord and it was holy war, he was unwilling to do it. When it's for him and it's his trying to keep his seat of power, he's willing to.
Verse 20.
But one of the sons of Ahimelech, the son of Ahitub, named Abiathar, escaped and fled to David.
Alright, so something very interesting has happened in this passage.
In chapter two, a man of God comes to Eli and says the priesthood is not going to stay with your family because you've dishonored me. He says they're going to be wiped out. There will only be left one who will cry his eyes out. That's what just happened. Abiathar is that one.
And eventually it's taken from him. He doesn't get to carry on serving the Lord. So the curse of God is poured out on this family through the wicked choices of Saul.
So Saul is very wrong to do what he does. But we also see the hand of God at work in fulfilling his promises. It's a very interesting thing that happens here. But it doesn't mean that Saul's right to do what he does. It just means that when God says something, it happens.
And Abiathar told David that Saul had killed the priests of the Lord.
And David said to Abiathar,
"I knew on that day when Doeg the Edomite was there, that he would surely tell Saul, I have occasioned the death of all the persons of your father's house."
David's response is, that's on me. While David was on the run, while David was doing what he did, he said, I knew that. I knew he was going to tell him. And I don't know if David fully understood what was going to come from that. I don't see how he could have. But he just says, yeah, that's. I'm the one to blame for this.
Verse 21,
"Stay with me. Do not be afraid for he who seeks my life seeks your life with me. You shall be in safekeeping."
So that's his response to Abiathar.
There's a very interesting call it a social phenomenon that's happening in this text. But everybody who's absolutely desperate is going to David. If everything has fallen apart, if you have no hope of a future, if everything has fallen around your ears, they go to David.
And I can't help but see that and see that that's exactly what happens in the New Testament with Jesus. That when Jesus is on earth, the people who flock to him are the poor, the destitute, the sinners, the weak, the small, the outcasts.
This actually is one of the things that he and the religious leaders get into arguments over all the time. They're like, you hang out with absolute human garbage. And Jesus is like, right, because the sick need a physician, not the well.
And there's this thing where if you really know that you're in need, you start looking for somewhere to go, some bit of hope, someone to run to.
And so we see in this story as it plays out that you have fear, legitimate, real, terrible fear, actual bad things.
And David, as we follow this out, he runs to the Lord and there's all of these people that run to David. And then there's Saul who tries to handle everything in his own strength.
And I told you earlier that we would see. I'm trying to tell you the scariest place to be.
The scariest place to be is where you are the biggest person in the world.
The scariest place to be is where you are utterly, completely, absolutely self-sufficient.
The scariest place to be is where the center of existence has boiled down to your center of gravity, where it's all up to you.
That's where Saul is.
Trust, no one believes, no one hopes in nothing, just whatever he can tooth and nail and claw and grab, whatever he can get done, all up to him.
And I don't know if you know it, but that's what our culture has told you over and over again is what you need to go do.
Express yourself, find yourself, succeed, accomplish, win, earn.
It's up to you.
The most powerful snowflake in the world that you've got to on your own. Be sufficient, be capable, be good.
That's what religion shows up and tells you so often is be good, be moral, do it. It's up to you.
That's terrifying.
The guards around Saul know something that we need to know is that one day you're going to stand before the real Lord, the real King.
And on that day you do not want to stand in yourself self-sufficient.
You do not want to stand before the King and say, judge me, evaluate me, I am big enough, I am good enough, I am capable.
That's terrifying.
You don't want to live your life that way.
And you certainly don't want to end your life that way.
We get to do with Jesus what Abiathar does with David and we get to have the same response.
We get to run to him and say, I have no hope anywhere but with you.
And what David says to Abiathar is what Jesus says to us.
Your life is connected to my life and with me you'll be in safekeeping.
That we get to hide ourselves in Christ.
That when he died for sins, he died for us.
That when he was buried, we were buried.
When he rose, we rise.
We get to be hidden in Christ and what he has accomplished.
And we get to stand before the Lord in Christ and not in ourselves and not in our sufficiency.
But we get to say, I have hidden in him.
And no one is put to shame who takes refuge in the Lord.
David prophetically says it at the end of his psalm.
"The Lord redeems the life of his servants. None of those who take refuge in him will be condemned."
And then we get to live like that in all the fears of life.
You get to go to the Lord. You get to do what David did. He's in the, he's in the cave and he's rehearsing.
You know how long it takes to write a song? It's possible that this just came out, but I think a lot of it is he's working on, he's rehearsing, he's remembering and he's reminding himself over and over and over and over again.
My hope is in you. My trust is in you. I have no good apart from you.
Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.
Nobody who is condemned, who places their hope in you.
Nobody who runs to you in refuge, oh, let me hide in you.
Over and over and over and over again.
And then we get to do the same thing that we don't in the middle of fear go, I must act, I've got to do something.
But we get to in the middle of the fear go, okay Lord, if you don't help, I'm in trouble. If you don't show up, I'm in trouble.
I see so often in my own sin. I'll talk to the Lord and I'll say, Lord, if you aren't merciful, if you don't forgive sinners, I have no hope.
But oh thank you that you do. And let me hide in you.
Let me. Let the righteousness of Christ be applied to me.
Let his life and death and burial apply to me.
Let me hide in him.
It's one of my favorite songs is Rock of Ages.
And just at the end it says,
"Let me hide myself in thee, let me hide in you."
And let it be about you.
And so if you've never seen that you actually are not capable enough, strong enough, good enough, if your whole world is about you and you still think you are strong enough, I would say no, come to the Lord.
But if you know you're in debt, in sin, you're destitute, you're distressed, you're bitter, come to the Lord, run to him and say, I need to hide in you.
And for the Christians in the room who are struggling with fear, rehearse for yourself what's true about him.
Start with Psalm 34.
Read it, pray it. Sit. Remind yourself my hope is bound up in you.
That's what Colossians 3 says,
"Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory."
We are hidden with him.
His life and our life, our life is bound up in him.
And with him we are in safe keeping.
Let's pray.
Lord, I pray right now in the name of Jesus, for every person in this room who is self-sufficient. For every person in this room who, when it all boils down, it's just them. Just them and their wisdom, just them and their morality, just them and their strength, just them and their ingenuity, that it's just them.
Lord, I pray that you would, through your Spirit, help them to see how small and how vulnerable and how scary that is, that they might run to you.
Lord, we pray for the person in this room who already sees that, who already feels debt, distress, destitute, desperate, that they would run headlong to you and say, oh, let your life cover me, let your righteousness apply to me. Let me hide myself in you.
And Lord, may the Christians in this room rehearse that over and over and over again. That in fear we might fear you more and know that no one is condemned who takes refuge in you.
In Jesus' name, Amen.
The band's going to come back up. We're going to respond in communion and worship.
1 Samuel 20
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. If you weren't here earlier, I said, my name is Spencer, I'm one of the pastors. We are going to be mostly in First Samuel, chapter 20 as we jump back into First Samuel. We took one break last week, but we're jumping right back in. But we're going to start in actually going back something we've already read back in chapter 18 today. Because what we're going to be seeing in chapter 20 is the friendship of Jonathan and David. But that really begins in 18. And I just wanted the first verse to kind of give us a preview of where we're going.
But in 18:1 it said as soon as he had finished speaking to Saul, this is David.
The soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David. And Jonathan loved him as his own soul.
So this is after David kills Goliath, he sees Jonathan, Jonathan sees him and it says their soul was knit together. And this is the beginning of one of the most famous friendships in all of history. And it begins with two souls knit together in a deep, lasting friendship.
Now as we read this and as we follow the story today, there are parts of us that long for that, that long to have a friendship like this. But where we are kind of culturally, we're not set up well to understand this. I mean, there's lots of warning signs about this. You can look at statistics on this. They've measured kind of friendship and loneliness in America. The bigger problem actually is male friendship and male loneliness. So last year in 2024, they did a study that said that 26% of men reported having six or more close friends. Now back in 1990, that was 55%. So it just kind of shows that over time men are growing lonelier, don't have deep friendships with others like they used to. It's a problem for men and women.
They surveyed all adults. 12% of all adults say they have zero close friends. That 12% of all American adults don't have a friend at all. And we feel the difficulty of that. It gets more complicated, it seems, as you get older to keep friends. That at the end of the movie Stand by Me, a movie from the 80s that captures friendship amongst 12 year old boys, but at the very end he's an adult and he's reflecting back on that summer. And I'll clean up the quote a little bit because it's not appropriate, but he says, I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was 12. Goodness, does anyone.
And it's just capturing, like, yeah, I mean, the type of you remember as a kid how innocent you jumped into friendships? I got a. My youngest, she meets everyone. She's like, I'm gonna be your best friend. Just jumps in immediately. And there's this depth you have that you begin to lose over time. And it begins to get more and more difficult.
One of the jokes that's been thrown around the last few years is that no one talks about the miracle of Jesus having 12 close friends in his 30s. And it's like there's some merit to that where it's just. It's difficult, friendships are difficult. But there's. As culture is seeing this, there's a problem here. There's an epidemic of loneliness, particularly in men. And there's all types of risks associated with this. There's risks to physical health, mental health, to all types of risk of suicide. There's this epidemic of loneliness that hits everyone, that hits men particularly the most.
And a problem for us as we approach this story is that we don't have categories to think about these two men and the closeness that they have culturally. The culture doesn't have a category for this without trying to think that something romantic is going on. And that is because closeness and friendship has even been over sexualized. I mean, years ago there was a very weak attempt to try to fabricate a romantic relationship between David and Jonathan. There's nothing in the text, there has never been anything in these stories to say that over 3,000 years of commentaries on this backs that up. There's nothing here. So that attempt, though weak, isn't around as much anymore. It certainly was agenda driven trying to legitimize homosexuality. But I think it's also symptomatic of a culture, especially amongst men, that cannot conceive of closeness amongst two men. That two men's souls being knit together is literally seen as God gay by our culture. And that's a problem. It's a problem that we can't conceive of nearness like this in men or women, but particularly a problem for men.
So what I'm hoping today is as we walk through this, we're going to view this friendship between David and Jonathan and we're going to see three essential aspects of what it means to be a godly friend. And then my hope is, is that as we learn from David and Jonathan, as we glean from this passage, that we would see where to find the purest form of friendship.
So let me pray and then we'll walk through this together. God, I pray that you give us ears to hear this certainly is not a neutral subject. There are folks here that are struggling in friendships right now. There are folks here that are longing for friendship, feeling lonely. God, I pray that you would speak to us this morning. And we respond as the church is supposed to, by loving you and obeying your word in Jesus name. Amen.
All right, so the verse one said as soon as going back to chapter 18, as soon as he had finished speaking to Saul,
The soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David. And Jonathan loved him as his own soul. And Saul took him that day and would not let him return to his father's house. Then Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as his own soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was on him and gave it to David and his armor and even his sword and his bow and his belt.
Okay, so what we see from here and some examples here, but also the thread that gets pulled throughout this story is the first essential aspect of, of godly friendship. And that is that godly friendship is selfless. The godly friendship is selfless.
We see that Jonathan loves David, and we see later on that David loves Jonathan. It says their souls were knit together, that they kind of make this covenant of friendship. And one of the first things that Jonathan does is a seeing Jonathan seeing David and his soul as more valuable than his. So he loved him like it was his own soul. And then he gives up, says his robe and his armor and his sword and his bow and his belt, that he considers David as more important. He's selfless. He shows a deference here. And that's what godly friendship is. It's caring about your friend more than you do your own self.
But that is not what our culture values in friendship. Our culture doesn't see friendship that way. Our culture sees friendship mostly as back scratching. I scratch your back, but then you got to scratch my back. And if you don't scratch my back, we got a problem. We have an invisible scoreboard for friends in our lives that they have to keep up. They got to do the same. They got to be able to reciprocate. And if they don't, it's a problem. And what happens is when your friend is actually struggling, you're like, what have you done for me? I'm pouring myself out. What are you doing for me?
And there's certainly, listen, there certainly is some wisdom in not burning yourself out on fools. I mean, the Proverbs make that clear. They'll be friends of fools. So there's some wisdom in that. But I think largely what happens is, is that we've made friendship consumeristic. We've watched a lot of Seinfeld, a lot of Friends, a lot of How I Met Your Mother, a lot of shows that make friendship about fun and what they can be given to you and the fun they add to your life. And the moment that your friend is struggling and the moment that your friend is not as fun as they used to be, well, their utility has been used up and then we move on. That's what happens.
But we should look for friends that are selfless. And we should be a friend that is selfless. That's helpful when you go through seasons that are difficult. Last year in particular was not a fun year. This was not a fun year for me, not a fun year for my family. We just had a lot of difficulties and a lot of trials that we were working through. And I was so thankful to Jesus that I had friends that displayed this selflessness, that I had friends that would, at a moment's notice, drop everything and come and watch our children. I had friends that I knew prayed for us regularly. Like they didn't. Just like they didn't say they did, but they actually did it. Actually, I knew that they were regularly praying.
I had friends that would ask questions, difficult questions. I had friends that would embody Proverbs 27:6 that said,
Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but profuse are the kisses of an enemy.
Meaning that good friends are willing to risk relational discomfort in wounding you temporarily for your ultimate good. To have friends that are willing to risk relational capital and make things difficult, to say difficult things to you because it's ultimately for your good, because they care more about you than do the comfort of friendship. We need that.
I was so thankful to God that I had that. And we should seek to be these types of friends like Jonathan, who was selfless.
One of the things that you see throughout this story is that as from this point forward, Jonathan begins to decrease and David begins to increase in favor. Going into chapter 20, you see that Jonathan, who was the son of King Saul, that they start to decrease and Jonathan and David grows in favor with the people. And not for a moment do you see Jonathan respond in selfishness and jealousy and envy of what his friend is getting.
That's wonderful.
One of the things I appreciate about Chet Phillips, which let me give a caveat here, what I'm about to say is something actually really genuine about our friendship. Because I know if you've been here long enough, you know, we poke fun at each other a lot. We burn each other. That's what we do. He preaches, he makes fun of me. I preach, I make fun of him. We're savage towards each other. It's part of our love language.
I'm not going to comment on how he gives awkward hugs. I'm not going to comment on how his face is naturally very angry looking. Looks like the kind of dad that would yell at the refs at a youth football game. I'm not going to say any of that. What I'm about to say is actually quite genuine.
That I appreciate about our friendship is that he is not jealous. There are times where God has blessed me and he's eager to know about it. And he digs. He says, no, no, no, no, tell me more about him. I was like, well, I mean, you know, this happened and that was good. And this happened and that was good. And some folks when you share with, sometimes you're like, you can tell. They're like, oh, I'm so happy for you. It's so good. I'm so glad that God has blessed you. And you're like, okay, I'm gonna reel it back in a little bit.
But with him, he just says, no, tell me more. I want to know. I want to be able to, I want to be joyful when God has blessed you. And that's selflessness. And I appreciate that about the friendship that we have. And that's what Jonathan is to David. As David increases in favor, Jonathan is not envious. He's not clinging to favor of the people, but he's selfless towards David.
Now we're through chapter 19. We saw that Jonathan's father, Saul, King Saul, is trying to kill David over and over again. And then finally we saw at the end of chapter 19 where Saul comes to boldly kill David at the feet of the prophet Samuel. And that God defends David with prophecy, that Saul is stricken with prophecy, prophetic praise. That's how chapter 19 ended.
Years have gone by at this point and Saul is growing in rage towards David. David. And now it's very clear that Saul has it out completely for David. Everybody knows it. And the friendship of Jonathan and David is really being tested in chapter 20 as his rage has been unrelenting. And there's this wonder, did Saul actually, was he changed by God when he was prophesying? Or does he still want David dead? And David thinks, absolutely, he still wants me dead.
So we pick up in verse one of chapter 20, it says,
Then David fled from Naioth at Ramah and came and said before Jonathan, "What have I done? What is my guilt and what is my sin before your father that he seeks my life?" And he said to him, "Far from it! You shall not die. Behold, my father does nothing either great or small without disclosing it to me. And why should my father hide this from me? It is not so." But David vowed again, saying, "Your father knows well that I have found favor in your eyes." And he thought, "Do not let Jonathan know this, lest he be grieved." But truly, as the Lord lives and as your soul lives, there is but a step between me and death."
David's like, your dad wants to kill me. No, really, he wants to kill me. And Jonathan's like, no, no. And then David's like, no, you don't understand. He's trying to. He's still trying to kill me. And Jonathan's like, don't you know that if I find out about this, I'm gonna let you know? And David's like, yeah, but your father knows. He knows of our friendship. He knows of our love for one another. He's gonna hide this from you.
And David, you can tell how distressed he is. And he's like, I'm a step away from death. And then Jonathan hears all this and he says,
Then Jonathan said to David, "Whatever you say, I will do for you."
Okay, whatever you say, I'll do for you. Which again highlights the selflessness of Jonathan. All right, I hear you. I'm listening. What can I do?
Verse 5.
David said to Jonathan, "Behold, tomorrow is the new moon, and I should not fail to sit at the table with the king. But let me go, that I may hide myself in the field to the third day at evening. If your father misses me at all, then say, 'David earnestly asked leave of me to run to Bethlehem, his city, for there is a yearly sacrifice there for all the clan.' If he says, 'Good,' it will be well with your servant. But if he is angry, then know that harm is determined by him."
So David comes up with a plan. They're going to test the wrath of Saul. He says, I'm not going to show up to the new moon festival. This is a time of festivities where they would make sacrifices to the Lord. He was expected to attend as being a part of the king's court. And he says, if I don't show up and your father is okay with it, we'll know that his wrath has subsided and I can come back. But if he's angry and that shows up in my absence I will know that he wants me dead.
Verse 8.
Therefore deal kindly with your servant, for you have brought your servant into a covenant of the Lord with you. But if there is guilt in me, kill me yourself, for why should you bring me to your father?"
And Jonathan said,
Far be it from you! If I knew that it was determined by my father that harm should come to you, would I not tell you?
Then Jonathan said. Then David said to Jonathan, "Who will tell me if your father answers you roughly?" And Jonathan said to David, "Come, let us go out into the field." So they both went out into the field.
So again this back and forth of how am I going to know? How am I going to know that I'm going to be safe? And Jonathan brings them out into the field and they continue this.
In verse 12 it says,
Jonathan said to David, "The Lord, the God of Israel, be witness when I have sounded out my father about this time tomorrow or the third day. Behold, if he is well disposed towards David, shall I not then send and disclose it to you?"
He said, if I find out, I'm going to let you know.
Verse 13.
But should it please my father to do you harm, the Lord do so to Jonathan. More also, if I do not disclose it to you and send you away, that you may go in safety."
He says, if I catch wind that my father wants you dead, I will let you know so that you can safely escape. May the Lord be with you as he has been with my father.
Which Paul's right there. That is the recognition very clearly from Jonathan that the favor of God has shifted from Saul in his house to David. And what he's going to say next is the recognition and the acceptance that David is the anointed king, the one who Samuel anointed to be the next king.
Verse 14.
"If I am still alive, show me the steadfast love of the Lord, that I may not die. And do not cut off your steadfast love from my house forever, when the Lord cuts off every one of the enemies of David from the face of the earth."
And that is a part of this friendship covenant. This agreement is the request: when you become king in your steadfast love towards me, do not take this out on my descendants. My children live as you become king. And Jonathan made a covenant with the house of David, saying,
"May the Lord take vengeance on David's enemies."
And Jonathan made David swear again by his love for him, for he loved him as he loved his own soul.
So they're bound together in this covenant of friendship that will outlive them. And I want us to see the second essential aspect of godly friendship, and that is that godly friendship is steadfast. The godly friendship is steadfast.
Show me the steadfast love of the Lord. Do not cut off your steadfast love from my house forever.
Jonathan asks. Godly friendship is steadfast. You need friends who are steadfast, who are faithful when times are difficult. And you should want to be the type of friend who is steadfast, immovable, faithful to your friend when they are struggling. You should want to embody this type of friendship.
This is what the Proverbs are capturing in Proverbs 18:24, when it says,
A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.
Proverbs 17:17 says,
A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity,
that you want friends and to be the kind of friend who loves at all times, who's born for the difficult moments of life.
So Matt Freeman, who is one of our pastors, and if you've been coming around, if you're new, been around the last couple of months, you haven't seen Matt. He's been on sabbatical for the last three months. This is actually the final week of sabbatical. Be back next week, which is exciting. Yeah, you can celebrate that, ten of you.
But one of the things I've appreciated about the friendship that Matt and I have is that over, really, the close to the last decade of doing ministry together, I know that Matt is going to be steadfast. I know that he's going to be there when things are difficult, when you do ministry together, like, there are things that are wonderful that you get to celebrate of how God is at work in some powerful ways. And there's also a lot of moments of difficulty. And I've just known for years, like, he's there, that he's in it with me, that he's going to stick closer than a brother, that he's going to be steadfast.
I know that when things get difficult, he's going to be there. He's going to. I know that I'm going to get a message from him asking, how are you doing? How's your soul? How's your walk? With Jesus, how's your family? I know he's going to ask. I know he's going to ask difficult questions because he's there with me, side by side. Even when we get in each other's grill sometimes, because every now and then we'll have an argument, we'll have a dust up, because that's what happens when you work together. And there are times when my wife is like, oh, you guys got an argument, and there's tension in her voice and it's like, it's okay, like, we're fine. We're for each other. We're for each other's good. We're going to disagree at times, but I know that he's going to ride or die. I know that we're going to stick it out together because there's this steadfastness, this loyalty, this faithfulness within him.
And that's the type of faithfulness and steadfastness that Jonathan and David display towards each other. That in the face of death, in the face of some really big political changes that are happening, they are knit together, their love and their friendship is. Is steadfast, it is going to make it and traverse through any of the storms they're about to face.
And that is the type of friendship that we should seek and the type of friends we should seek to be. There's a steadfastness in their friendship.
It continues in verse 18 as they're working out this plan.
Then Jonathan said to him, "Tomorrow is the new moon, and you will be missed because your seat will be empty on the third day. Go down quickly to the place where you hid yourself when the matter was in hand, and remain beside the stone heap. And I will shoot three arrows to the side of it as though I shot at a mark. And behold, I will send the boy, saying, 'Go find the arrows.' If I say to the boy, 'Look, the arrows are on this side of you, take them,' then you are to come, for as the Lord lives, it is safe for you and there is no danger. But if I say to the youth, 'Look, the arrows are beyond you,' then go, for the Lord has sent you away. And as for the matter of which you and I have spoken, behold, the Lord is between you and me forever."
So they devise this plan because it seems like they can't even be seen together at this point that they're going to have. He's going to go out, he's going to shoot arrows, and he says, I shoot him. And they land on this side. And I say to my arrow boy, go to this side and if you get the arrows, you'll know that's the signal. It's safe to come out, it's safe to come back.
Saul doesn't want to kill you. But if I shoot beyond and I tell my arrow boy that the arrows are beyond, you should know that you need to run because my father wants to kill you. So that's the secret sign that they work out together.
All right? Verse 24.
So David hid himself in the field. And when the new moon came, the king sat down to eat food. The king sat on his seat, as at other times on the seat by the wall. Jonathan sat opposite and Abner sat by Saul's side. But David's place was empty.
Verse 26.
Yet Saul did not say anything that day, for he thought something has happened to him. He is not clean, surely he is not clean.
He just thinks, okay, he might be ceremonially unclean. So if you're ceremonially unclean, you can't be in the presence of others. You gotta do some rituals, come back. He'll be back the next day.
Verse 27.
But on the second day, the day after the new moon, David's place was empty. And Saul said to Jonathan, his son, "Why has not the son of Jesse come to the meal either yesterday or today?"
Jonathan answered Saul,
"David earnestly asked leave of me to go to Bethlehem. He said, 'Let me go, for our clan holds a sacrifice in the city, and my brother has commanded me to be there.' So now if I found favor in your eyes, let me get away and see my brothers.' For this reason, he has not come to the king's table."
So I'm going to sugarcoat that straight up lie. Bible's not prescriptive and sometimes like this very descriptive of what's happening here. So he lies. Saul doesn't buy it at all.
Verse 30.
Then Saul's anger was kindled against Jonathan. And he said to him, "You son of a perverse rebellious woman!"
Which that's his wife taking shots everywhere.
"You son of a perverse, rebellious woman, do I not know that you have chosen the son of Jesse to your own shame and the shame of your mother's nakedness? For as long as the son of Jesse lives on earth, neither you nor your kingdom shall be established."
Which what he does there is he appeals to the base desire of power. Don't you know that David sits on the throne that you're supposed to sit on next? That he's taking the throne from you to your own shame? Jonathan, will you not turn him over? Turn him in so that you can be the future king.
He appeals to this base desire for power.
For as long as the Son of Jesse lives on earth, neither you nor your kingdom shall be established. Therefore send and bring him to me, for he shall surely die."
And Jonathan answered Saul, his father,
"Why should he be put to death? What has he done?"
But Saul hurled his spear at him to strike him.
So Jonathan knew that his father was determined to put David to death.
And Jonathan rose from the table in fierce anger and ate no food the second day of the month. For he was grieved for David because his father had disgraced him.
So Jonathan seeks to again make the case he's done nothing to you. He's only done good to you.
In this country does what Saul does repeatedly, which is pick up. I don't know if he has these spears handy all the time. I mean, he just must rule with a spear. But he also, he's not good at it because he misses again. Happens multiple times in the story. He keeps missing.
And Jonathan is grieved. He's grieved because he knows that his father seeks to kill him. And this is going to change things going forward.
Verse 35.
In the morning, Jonathan went out to the field to the appointment with David and with him, a little boy. They're going to enact a plan, he said to his boy, "Run and find the arrows that I shoot." As the boy ran, he shot an arrow beyond him. And when the boy came to the place of the arrow that Jonathan had shot, Jonathan called after the boy and said, "It's not the arrow beyond you," it's the signal." And Jonathan called after the boy, "Hurry, be quick and do not stay."
So Jonathan's boy gathered up the arrows and came to his master. But the boy knew nothing. Only Jonathan and David knew the matter.
And Jonathan gave his weapons to his boy and said to him,
"Go and carry them in."
Carry them to the city so that signals you need to run. My father wants to kill you.
Verse 41.
As soon as the boy had gone, David rose from beside the stone heap and fell on his face to the ground and bowed three times. And they kissed one another and wept with one another, David weeping the most.
Then Jonathan said to David,
"Go in peace, because we have sworn both of us in the name of the Lord, saying, 'The Lord shall be between me and you and between my offspring and your offspring.'"
For
And they rose and departed, and Jonathan went into the city.
So when the arrow boy is there, their emotions are held together and they begin to be released.
Now you might be thinking, as I thought, why did you go to all this trouble to do this sign if you're just going to pop out and talk? As I had the same thought, I don't fully know my best, my best take is that that was the plan. But they're so overwhelmed by emotion and they're so overwhelmed by their love for one another that this can't be the last time they see each other, that they're willing to risk safety for the sake of embracing one last time as friends.
So he comes out, bows to the ground, showing deference and respect. They kiss, which this is like Italians do today. This is a cultural greeting for them. So this is kissing on both sides of the cheek. New Testament says, greet each other with a holy kiss.
You've been here long enough, you know, we don't do that. We're not going to start. But this is dapping each other up. This is bro huggin. This is the culturally appropriate way to greet one, to greet a friend like this. So they greet, they embrace, and they weep.
This is David. So David wept the most, weeping bitterly. And I think the reason, A, why they're willing to risk coming out in the open and B, why this is such a grievous moment, such a sad filled moment is because they know everything's going to change. Their friendship and the way that it has gone is not going to continue. David's going to be on the run for the rest of his days. They won't be together anymore and their hearts are broken because of the love they have for one another as friends and what they're having to give up to continue.
And that brings me to the third essential aspect of godly friendship. And that godly friendship is sacrificial. The godly friendship is sacrificial.
It's hard to tell when Jonathan knew fully that David was the one that Samuel had anointed to be the future king of Israel. Some are going to argue and say that in the beginning of chapter 18, when he gives up his cloak, he gives up his, his robe and his armor that's symbolic of the passing of the torch and that Jonathan in that moment was conveying that. I think that's a little speculative, but I wouldn't lean and say that's put a ton of force on that. It certainly shows a great amount of deference and respect.
But boy, oh boy, when you get through chapter 19, if you're not convinced by the end of chapter 19, it's so clear here in chapter 20 that Jonathan knows that God has chosen David to be king and not him. He knows it.
Which means that every single step that Jonathan takes in helping David is solidifying David on the throne and not him. That every time, that he continues to help David, every time he helps save and preserve his life, that he is counting the future of David as more significant than his own. That he's sacrificing his place on the throne.
He's not fighting the will of God. He's trusting in God's will and his choice. And also loving his friend sacrificially. It's a beautiful picture. What friendship is supposed to be in sacrificial friendship.
One of the themes that shows up in the Lord of the Rings and the series is friendship. One of the main themes of that story. And particularly if you focus on the friendship between Samwise and Frodo, the two hobbits, that is one filled with sacrificial friendship.
In the first movie, when Frodo has decided that he's going to go on his own, he's going to take the Ring himself, that he gets on the boat and Sam, who cannot swim, follows him out into the water and begins to drown himself because he's so committed for the betterment of Frodo to help his friend that he's willing to sacrifice his own life to make the point.
The books quote and say, "I'll knock holes in all the boats." That's this thing. You're not going without me. I'm giving up my life, my safety, for the sake of helping you and the burden that you are carrying. I'll sink every boat and we'll sink together. But you're not going out alone.
And when you follow that story throughout all three of the movies or books, you see this over and over and over again, all the way to the very end where they're almost there to deliver the Ring and they're starving and they only got a little food left. And Sam gives Frodo the majority of the food, sacrificing for the sake of his friend who's so deeply burdened. It's a beautiful picture of sacrificial friendship.
Are you willing to be the type of friend that says, I will sink this boat? You're not going anywhere until we talk this through, until you tell me what's going on, until you let me help you. Are you willing to be the type of friend who's willing to go without that your friend is struggling and they're in their season of adversity. And when you talk, they're mostly sharing about their problems. But you're willing to sacrifice sharing your life for the sake of helping them bear this burden. Because you love them and because you count them more significant than yourself. Are you willing to be a sacrificial friend on behalf of your friends?
That's what Jonathan was to David. It's a beautiful picture of sacrificial friendship. To love your friend at cost to yourself. Your friendship was filled with selfless, steadfast and sacrificial friendship.
Now as you walk through this, you may be receiving this and may be thinking and evaluating. Man, I wish I had friends like that. You may be thinking about the friends in your life. I wish that person was more selfless. That person, they're not steadfast, they're not faithful like they should be. They're not sacrificing.
And what I want to push on is I think you've missed a step. Because if you're immediate response to this story is to begin to evaluate all the ways that your friends have failed you, you haven't looked in the mirror first.
Jesus says,
"Take the plank out of your own eye, so that you can see the speck in your brother's eye."
You should do the soul work of examining your own heart and asking difficult questions.
Have I been selfless? Like, really considering others more significant than myself? Are you steadfast? Are you there when things are difficult? Are you looking for an exit as soon as things get difficult, as soon as the fun stops? Do you sacrifice? Do you give up time? Do you give up energy? Are you willing to give away for the sake of your friend and your friends?
And maybe you do that soul work and you say, yeah, I need to repent here. I need to change here. I need to have a conversation there. And then you come to the conclusion, but, yeah, but there's still this longing within me. Like, I've tried to be a friend for years and this type of deep friendship has eluded me for years. And this becomes really a story of pain for you.
What I'd like to suggest is two things.
The first, don't give up. I think the Church of Jesus Christ is a beautiful place to find friends, to find deep friendships that embody the friendship of David and Jonathan.
So first is, don't give up. Press in.
The second is that it's very possible that you have placed your hope in the friendship of men and women. And what I want to very clearly say is that your ultimate hope should be in friendship with God. That this deep longing and desire will only be fully satiated and satisfied in friendship with God.
Because while Jonathan and David are a wonderful example of friendship, and they are, and we should learn from them, they are not the purest form of friendship that is found in this life.
You see, Jonathan and David start as two men who love each other. But the friendship that God offers doesn't start that way. The friendship that Jesus offers us is to people who are hostile to him, to people who oppose his very ways.
You see, when you read the Gospels and you get to a passage like Luke 7, when chapter 7, verse 34, when the Pharisees, the religious leaders are taking a shot at Jesus and they say,
"The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, 'Look at him, a glutton, a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.'"
That when we read that, we most often think about the self righteousness of the religious leaders because Jesus is willing to be friends with the lowliest, the sinners.
But what gets lost in them is that Jesus befriends crowds of people whose very lives and the choices that they make every day oppose the way that Jesus has set out for creation, that they, with every deliberate choice to sin against God, they have chosen to sin against Jesus.
And what this ultimately is, is foreshadowing of what Jesus offers us in the Gospel that we, as the passage we read earlier, were alienated and hostile in mind. What Mike was preaching about last week, that as Jesus displays kindness to us, we don't start that way. We are enemies of God.
So this isn't two people who love each other initially. This is Jesus who loves hostile sinners. And the love and the friendship that he offers us breaks through to our hearts in a way that captures us.
And another foreshadowing that Jesus does in his ministry. In John 15, Jesus says,
"Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends."
Which is a foreshadowing of what's about to happen in an act so selfless, so steadfast in love, so sacrificial, that Jesus lays down his life at the cross for enemies to make them friends.
That is the purest form of friendship that you can discover in this life. It is friendship with God and fellowship with him that you get a picture of now that resounds more beautifully, more wonderfully into eternity.
That is where our hope should be.
So yes, as we learn this and as we talk about this in groups this week, we absolutely should learn from David and Jonathan and we should see the selflessness and the steadfastness and the sacrificial nature of their friendship. And we should walk away from this, evaluating ourselves, the friends that we can be.
But for those of us that are longing for fellowship, those of us that are longing for friendship, we must first take the step of finding that in Christ and the most perfect and most pure friendship that is offered in him.
The band's going to come up and we get to do that and consider that for a moment, that we should consider Christ and what he offers.
And it is possible that for some of you, the loneliness that you feel in this life is not just because you don't have good friends. It's because you actually don't have Christ.
And my hope for you this morning is that you would find your hope for fulfillment and friendship in Christ and Him alone.
And for those of us who have trusted in Jesus, some of us need to walk away and we need to. We might need to have some conversations with some people this week, might need to confess some sin and confess some ways that we have failed, might need to consider the ways in which we need to grow in this so that we can be the type of godly friend that desires that God desires his people be.
Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us see the friendship that is offered in you, the friendship that is offered in our Savior, in Christ, the friend that we have in him. God, I pray that that would compel our hearts towards faith and surrendering to have fellowship with you from here into eternity. God, I pray that we would not leave this word without reflecting on our own hearts and the ways that we have failed to be the friends that God has called us to be and that we would change. And that the fruit that comes out of the effort this week results in reconciliation. It results in love, results in service, results in godliness and friendship. We ask this in Jesus name, Amen.
Luke 6:27-36
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Mike and I was going to walk out the back door, but Isaac had to mention my name in the prayer, so I decided to go ahead and come on up here today. I am not one of the pastors here, but I am an elder in training. Over the last several years in my life, I've been exercising the calling of God that I feel on my life and in my heart toward pastoral ministry. It's something that I have felt growing for a long time. A few months ago, I was asked to participate in the elder training process. I am working this calling out. I'm not just a pastor when I want to be. I am working this calling out with my friends, with my community group, and under the guidance of our elders here. They've given me this opportunity this morning.
I have a day job. I am a physician kind of by training, and that's what I do Monday through Friday throughout the week. Over the last several years, I have had the opportunity to teach in different settings here in our church. I've been able to teach some of your children in the kids city setting. We actually do an assembly similar to this, and we do 60 to 70 minutes of teaching and they don't complain. So no, we do just a couple short minutes of teaching with them and then we break out into classrooms and teach, and I've gotten to share the Scriptures with them there.
I had the opportunity to share the Scriptures with some of your teenagers in the student night setting. Just this last semester, I was able to teach alongside Isaac Hill, who heads that up, and we were working through the Gospel of John. We were blessed by that, and we were thankful to be able to share that with the teenagers in that setting.
I've also been able to teach some of you next door in the Sunday school setting just last week. I was able to do that. Our brother Scott Hill faithfully teaches that class week after week after week. That meets in our other building at 9:30. It's an excellent opportunity to study the word together, and he's let me teach alongside him and he's given me the opportunity to fill in for him when he steps away.
I was asked or I was given the option to pick the text that I wanted to, and I decided to pick something from the New Testament. We've been going through Samuel, right? We've been going through Old Testament narrative, and I was thinking, well, maybe let's step away from that and let's go into the New Testament for a little bit and spend a week here. I thought, what specifically would our congregation want to hear? And I thought, well, maybe something with a lot of imagery, a lot of pictures, a lot of symbolism, something that's got parts of it that are hotly contested and debated. And so, of course, I landed on Revelation. But I decided maybe something a little bit different would be more appropriate for our setting.
Today, we are going to be in the Gospel of Luke. We're going to be in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 6, verses 27-36. Before we start, I'm going to pray and ask for the Lord's help.
Father, we thank you for the opportunity to study the Scripture this morning. We've really got nothing apart from it. It tells us of you, and it's our privilege to be able to know it, to study it, and to have our lives changed from it. You know that I am a man desperately in need of grace, and I pray that you would meet me with your grace this morning in Jesus' name. Amen.
So let's open up our Bibles to Luke chapter 6, verses 27-36. This is on page 53 in the blue Bible. The blue Bibles are under the seats in the rows in front of you and you can grab those, and if you don't have a Bible you can actually keep that. We want you to have a copy of God's word.
Like I said, we are stepping out today from the Old Testament narrative in Samuel, narrative of David, of Saul, of the Israelite people, of Samuel himself at that time, and now we're kind of jumping into the New Testament narrative in the Gospel of Luke. This is the story of Jesus Christ.
Just briefly for some context, Luke wrote this gospel around 58 to 60 AD. It is a defense of the Christian faith. It tells the story of the Christ on earth and it shows us Jesus's mission which was to bring salvation to people as well as fulfill some of the Old Testament prophecies that were written about him. Luke himself was a physician, so we can infer he was smart. He was probably pretty cool. I'll leave it there. He was a companion to the Apostle Paul, and Luke spent years interviewing eyewitnesses, people who walked alongside Jesus. And he compiled all of that into this gospel account.
What we're going to look at today, this section does mirror another section in a different gospel. And that's common for that to happen. But it mirrors some similar teaching more familiar you might have heard called the Sermon on the Mount which is Matthew 5 through 7. This passage in Luke has some similarities to it.
So what we're going to study or what we're going to look at is what Jesus has to teach his followers about kindness and compassion. We're going to begin in verse 27.
“But I say to you who hear,
Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,
bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.
To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also,
and from one who takes away your cloak do not withhold your tunic either.
Give to everyone who begs from you,
and from one who takes away your goods do not demand them back.
And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.”
Now, we probably hear all that and think, "Yeah, oh yeah, absolutely. That sounds good. That sounds fine." Especially when we hear that last verse, right? Because we can latch on to that because we've heard it before. That's one of those phrases that sort of has permeated and passed through our culture through generations. And it's something known as the golden rule.
Parents teach an aspect of this to their kids, right? When you hit your brother or when you're deciding, should I hit my brother? I want you to think, do you want your brother to hit you? And even at a young age, you can conceptualize that pretty well. I don't want to get hit. I'm not going to hit my brother.
Teachers in a classroom setting, right? As kids are going from, especially in younger ages, as they're going from being just at home to now interacting with people from other families, teaching them how to interact with those people, how they would want to be interacted with. And there's even probably some level in our workplaces that we apply this teaching, right? If you are wondering, should I put that in the email to everyone? Should I put that thing about my coworker in there? Maybe think, would you like to read that about you? Right? If you do that, that's probably a fairly safe way to navigate those different interactions.
So, we've heard this many times and we usually just agree. When was the last time you saw on CNN, golden rule is being revoked? We're anti-Golden rule, and the golden rule is canceled. Right? You don't see that happening. I actually did this week and Googled, is the golden rule outdated or something to see? I did find an article, but it was on a website I hadn't heard of, so I didn't click on it. I decided that that was probably not something that was being spread through the masses at large, so this would actually still make sense.
But if we are really going to understand what Jesus is calling us to do and really understand the weight of these statements, we have to go back and think about who he's commanding us to act this way towards. He says,
“Those who hate you, those who curse you, those who abuse you,
those who strike you, and those who take from you.”
Guys, this is not a call to be nice to your friends. This is not a call to be kind to the person that you sit next to on Sundays at church. This is a call to be kind to the people who absolutely cannot stand you.
Now, we have a tendency probably in our minds to think or to wonder, is Jesus overselling this, right? Is he going really far in how he's talking to us? But if you do half of that, it's probably fine. We have a tendency to think maybe this is just for effect. But to help us understand that, let's think about who he was talking to, who was standing in the crowd. That was a mix of Jewish people probably from Jerusalem and from Judea.
These are the people whose ancestors we read about when we studied the book of Exodus. These are the people who were enslaved by the Egyptian Pharaoh who never had a day off to rest from work, who made bricks to build up that kingdom, never seeing an ounce of the glory, an ounce of the honor for their own. Even when they were about to escape from Egypt, the Pharaoh in his final act sent his army out to die, trying to retrieve them and bring them back under oppression.
After that, they wandered through the wilderness for many years and they went through this cycle of oppression with other nations and judges, and God raised up judges for them. They turned from what God had said to them to do and they went back to their sin, and they're in this constant cycle of oppression.
And then right up to where we're studying on Sundays, these kingdoms said, "We want a king. We want a king." And they were given one. God relented, they were given a king. Ultimately that kingdom is fractured, and nothing comes of it, and they end up being dissipated and occupied by other nations, right? The Babylonians, the Persians—throughout history, these really prominent, massive empires occupied and oppressed this people group.
And now when Jesus is talking to them, they're under occupation still. They're under occupation from the Roman Empire. So he said all these things to a people that were hated, that were cursed, that were abused, that were struck, and that had every single thing taken from them. Jesus is not overstating or overselling this at all. This would have actually directly applied to the people that he was talking to that day. It would have probably been felt very deeply and viscerally by them. And this thing He was calling them to do would have seemed truly impossible.
Now, this teaching calls them into kindness, right? But what does it have to do with us? Two days ago, we celebrated a holiday that exists to show that we are not under another empire, that we are not subject to another regime. One of our pastors spent time giving missiles to people to shoot into the air just so they could show that a British soldier could not come into their house without a warrant and take their stuff and make them cook for them.
So we are not exactly under, in our current day and age, the oppression of another outside regime. Why this teaching still brings to bear on our lives is because things like hate, abuse, and stealing have been permeating cultures throughout all of time and they absolutely exist in our culture today. Even if you personally haven't experienced something like that or something that extreme, the point Jesus is getting at is not to minimize what you've walked through in your life actually, but to emphasize just how great the thing that he's calling us into is.
So I want us to go back through that text again and think about each one of these directives. Love your enemies. Love is sometimes a wishy-washy word or a phrase that our culture doesn't always know what it exactly means. But we do have some biblical data that tells us patience, kindness, not envying, not boasting, not making yourself out better than someone else. We have some terms for love that we can use.
Most commonly in our culture and in the Bible, we think about love in the sense of husbands and wives, spouses. That's a fairly easy example for us to grasp what love probably looks like. So here Jesus says,
"Love your enemies."
And tags it right up next to doing this. Or he says to love and tags this right up next to doing this to your enemies.
This is not like I'm driving down the road and somebody cuts me off in traffic and I say, "You know, I see him later," and I just wave them along. I'm going to be the bigger person. This is saying somebody's flying down the road and sideswipes me and I drive off the road and I hit a tree and I'm severely injured and my car is totally destroyed and I'm in the hospital for months and when I finally recover, I've got nothing left in my name. I barely have a car to drive. I'm going down the road and I see that same guy and his lane's ending and he's in trouble if he doesn't get over and I let him in. That's loving your enemies.
Doing good to those who hate you means improving the well-being of the person that actively hates you. When people hate us, we probably do one of two things. We either hate them back. "You're going to get into me. I'm going to get after you," like we're buttheads and have fights over things like that, or we just say, "No, you're not going to bother me. You're going to take the high ground and not say anything." And even we see this play out in kids in middle school and high school. There are either fistfights or people pretend like they don't hear what you say because that way it looks like it didn't bother me, and then at home they deal with the fallout of that.
But what doing good to those who hate you is, is when your neighbor comes to you and says, "I'm building a fence on my property and it's going to go five feet into your property line and I don't really care." No matter what you say to him, he's going to do that. One day you come home and it's not five feet on your lawn, it's 10 feet on your lawn. And if you live in a subdivision, that's a lot. So you are seriously out some space. And then when he comes home from work the following day, you're in his front yard. You've cut it perfectly. You're edging right along the driveway. You've got the leaf blower, and you're cleaning it off and you're making it look perfect.
That's actually improving the well-being of a person who hates you.
Bless those who curse you. Now, we don't have a great frame of reference for this currently. Blessing and cursing. I would wager that most of you who said bless this week meant it in the context of a sneeze. But that is not really what blessing is here. Blessing is I am praying for God's favor to be put on another person.
One of the famous examples we have comes from the Old Testament book of Numbers. God says to Moses,
"Go pronounce this blessing on your brother."
And it's
"The Lord bless you and keep you;
the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you;
the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace."
That's an actual blessing—wanting blessing for another person.
Cursing is also not the way we use it today or cussing. It's a little bit different than what we use today. Cursing is not foul language, rude gestures, inappropriate conversation, as we have it in our context. Cursing is more like the opposite of blessing in that I want your total ruin and total destruction to be brought down on somebody. We do have some Bible examples of cursing. Even just when sin entered in the world, God cursed the earth. And so you can look at different times in the Bible where we see cursing. But blessing and cursing are paired together.
So this is saying that while you are actively praying and asking God, "Will you give him 10 children who each have 10 children? Will you give him everyone in his family who is healthy? Would you make him live to be a hundred and fifteen, and pass away sweetly with his family surrounded by him? All his businesses, tens upon tens upon tens would have success and he would be rich and all the world's goods."
While you're asking that for a person, that same person is hoping that you're totally and completely destroyed off of the earth. While you're hoping for his peaceful end with him surrounded by his family, he's hoping your bloodline comes to an end, that you never find a partner, that you never have a child, and that your last name is totally and utterly destroyed.
That is blessing the people that curse you.
Pray for those who abuse you. This one is probably a little challenging for us to hear. The word abuse sits pretty heavy on our shoulders and even when we hear it, we recoil. Some of you have actually experienced real abuse in awful, awful ways.
Jesus here says,
"On your knees, intercede before the Father on behalf of the person who inflicted you this pain. Pray for those who abuse you."
To the one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also. Just sort of by way of explanation, this is not a little essay on pacifism. Should we fight in wars? Should I defend myself in my house? Striking someone on the cheek is really meant to symbolize or show disrespect. That's what it meant in this cultural context.
And I think we probably have that translate to our cultural moment today. I don't know if I was at an award show—the Tonys, the Grammys, maybe the Oscars—and somebody got up and said something disrespectful about my wife's hair, I might get up and slap that person, and that would be a sign of disrespect given back to them. And I think everybody would be able to do that. And of course, I would go on to win best actor.
This is when the guy at work puts you down, mocks you in front of everyone, and then later the boss comes to you and says, "Hey, you know, so and so, he's actually up for a promotion. What do you think?" And this is you saying, "You know, I think he's pretty good at his time management skills. I think he's got good computer skills," and you start highlighting different things about him that he doesn't deserve to have highlighted about him, but you start highlighting these positive things. Instead of returning disrespect with disrespect, you give respect to him and speak honorably about him.
And from the one who takes your cloak, do not withhold your tunic either. Give to everyone who begs from you. And from one who takes away your goods, do not demand them back.
So a cloak is like an outer covering like a jacket. A tunic is more underneath. It covers you from the shoulders down to the hips or ankles depending on how homeschooled you were. So this is saying be radically generous to the people who steal from you.
So, you're at the beach, you're on vacation, and you're walking down the street, and somebody picks your pocket and takes off, and you take off after them and you call the police and you got this guy. You caught him and the police look at you and say, "Well, he stole from you. Do you want to press charges?" And you say, "No." In fact, I had $100 in my wallet, but I'm going to write you a check. I'm going to write you a check for $200. Because this is what it means that when somebody takes your cloak not to withhold your tunic from them.
Also,
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
This really does summarize all of these directives well, guys. Sometimes we have such a strong desire for justice and it really, really irks us to see these perpetrators get away with things. But I do want to remind you that in the book of Hebrews, we're told,
"There is no creature hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account."
God will make these things right. People who commit injustices will be held accountable.
What he has not done is asked us in this text to mediate out and give out that justice. He teaches us to love. He teaches us to do good and he teaches us to give not just to the people that like us. Not even just to the people that are kind of indifferent to us or tolerate us, but to the people who absolutely cannot stand us and actively choose to oppose us.
Next here in the passage, he's going to talk to us about how the world accomplishes this. We're going to pick up in verse 32.
"If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them.
And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.
And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners and get back the same amount."
I think Jesus chooses to give us this explanation here because we sort of gravitate towards this, right? We want to be nice to the people that like us really. Well, if your friend calls you on the phone and they've had a rough day and they're going on and on and you're listening and being empathetic and encouraging them, at the end of the call, they say, "Wow, thank you. You were so kind. Thank you for listening." You might think, "Yeah, you know, I guess in just in the friend group, I'm the kind friend. Yeah, that makes sense."
Or if your co-worker, who you actually do get along with, who helps you out, gets a busy project thrown at them and they're going to be there late and you say, "You know what? I'm going to pitch in and help them take some of that workload off them." And then a few weeks later, you hear them talking and they're saying, "Yeah, you know, he pitched in and helped me right when I needed to. He sacrifices himself. He's so kind." You might think, "Yeah, I am the dependable co-worker. I am kind. I do that. Yeah."
Or if your friend forgets their wallet when you go out to lunch and you spot him and then you think, "Well, now I've got insurance if I ever forget my wallet and I'm out with him." Or if he asks, "Can I—he's going to buy pizza." I don't have to chip in because I already kicked in and gave it to them. We encounter these kind of circumstances all the time.
And this is probably how we think without realizing. We trick ourselves into thinking that we are more kind than we really are. And the reason is because the people we like to be kind to are the people that like us. And so Jesus here very directly is saying that if you're kind to people so that you can just be praised and rewarded, then you are no different than the people who don't follow Christ or don't know Christ because even they are capable of that.
Jesus calls us into sacrificial kindness and sacrificial giving. He calls us to do this to our enemies. And he rebukes the kindness that results in our own advancement in our own gain.
In World War II, on December 20th of 1943, a German pilot by the name of Franz Stigler was flying in German airspace and he encountered a very badly damaged bomber flown by an American pilot with an American crew. He could see holes from multiple bullets in this plane and he could see the crew looked weak and near the point of death. And he had a moment where he could have gone different ways. He could have shot that plane as an enemy out of the sky, reported it back, and been awarded for what he had done. But that's not what he did.
He flew up alongside the wing of this badly damaged American plane and escorted it out of German airspace because he knew that a German anti-aircraft gun would not shoot up at a German plane. He escorted them out to safety and they landed in Switzerland. After that moment finished, the two pilots got out and saluted each other and then the German pilot flew back into Germany. This was never publicized because at the time telling people that an enemy showed kindness isn't good for the war effort.
We don't want to think that our enemy is capable of that, right? But interestingly, in the early 2000s, years after, they were actually able to meet and they became friends and they remained friends until they both passed away just a few months apart from each other in the same year. I think this is just in a small way an example of what it means to look like to be kind or to be compassionate to your enemies.
Now go back with me if you will to the crowd. The crowd that stands there before Jesus. Imagine being one of those people who has been taught since birth from grandma, grandpa, mom, dad, all the cycles of oppression that have kept that people down. And even as they walk out of town to hear Jesus talk, they pass by Roman soldiers who are an ever-present reminder to them of the inescapable enemy that always lurks where they are.
And Jesus says,
"Love those people."
Some of the people that followed Jesus were even part of zealous religious groups who wanted to commit political violence and wanted to commit assassinations. And they're standing there listening to Jesus.
"Love your enemies."
Even you guys put yourself in that position, right? Imagine standing there and think to yourself, Jesus just said,
"Love the guy who put me down so he could get a promotion.
Love the girl that used to bully me in school.
Love the person that inflicted the most emotional pain and suffering or even physical suffering that I've ever experienced."
What would you be thinking? You would be thinking what they were thinking.
Why? Why on earth would we ever do it? They're awful. They are horrible. Why would I ever love them? And if I wanted to, how could it be possible that I could be capable of that?
And as the tension rises in their minds and as the tension rises in our own minds and these questions develop, Jesus tells us the answer:
"But love your enemies and do good and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.
Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful."
Jesus says that in order to be kind to our enemies, we must understand that God himself was kind to us. See, the answer we come up with is, "Oh, when they apologize to me, then I'll be kind." When they start changing their actions and I actually see it, then I'll be kind. But Jesus says,
"No, kindness to your enemies can only be achieved one way, and it's by understanding God's kindness to you."
Follow this with me. Jesus here teaches,
"Be kind to your enemies."
He roots that kindness in God's kindness to us. Why does that actually make sense? Romans 8:7-8:
"For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot.
Those who are in the flesh cannot please God."
It makes sense because before we knew Jesus Christ, we were God's enemies. And you might not think that's possible or you might think, "No, that's too much." Well, God, the infinite, existing before anything else for all time, spoke a world into existence, put people on that world to worship him. And I'm not even talking about going through the Ten Commandments and you lied. I'm sure you did. No, no, no, no. I'm talking this God is worthy of our worship at all times. And every time we sit and enjoy our house and we enjoy our family and we enjoy our truck and whatever, and we don't roll it up into worship of the almighty God, we have sinned and we are God's enemy.
Is it that serious? Absolutely. It's that serious. The only way that we can be kind is to understand that God forgave his enemies. And the people that were standing there that day, they've got no idea what's about to come. That he would go through a total sham of a trial and be convicted of a crime that he did not commit.
That he would be physically tortured, beaten, assaulted, that he would be given a purple robe and a crown of thorns, total mockery, so that he might feel shame. And they would make him pick up the cross and walk up the hill, put it up, and they nail him to it and hang him up there in front of everyone to see to execute him.
And while he's up there, we have his words recorded for us:
"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."
The beauty of the gospel is that Jesus Christ died for his enemies.
Romans 5:9-11, we read it this morning:
"Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.
For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.
But more than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation."
The story of the Bible is the story of God's kindness to us. So if you today don't know Christ in that way, that's the type of kindness I'm inviting you into. If you do know Jesus, he really does want you to be kind like this. Let's take time to ask the Spirit to reveal the areas where we overlook this teaching.
So, who hates you? Who have you hated? Who curses you? Who have you wanted to see destroyed? Who has abused you? Who has disrespected you? Who has taken from you your time, your money, whatever it is? Is it really important that we be kind to these people? Yes.
Romans 2:4-5:
"Do you despise the riches of his kindness, forbearance, and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?"
Kindness is crucial, but we need the help of the Spirit in order to do this. We cannot do it on our own. In our sin, we try to be kind and sometimes it doesn't work. And sometimes we try to be kind and we actually end up being rude and it goes the total opposite direction.
This is not how we naturally think about being kind. We think, well, it's genetic. Have you met that family? They're all smiling. That's not my family. We're sarcastic. We don't do that. We think someone is kind because they don't have the stress we do. If you had my job, you'd understand. I'm way too stressed out to just be kind to everybody I meet. I use it all up at work.
We think we don't have to be kind. Look at my kids. I spend all my time raising those kids, teaching those kids, and trying to be kind to those kids. I don't have leftover to give to the people outside of that. We think when things get better, then I'll be kind. My retirement account's in good shape. My bank account's in good shape. When my house is the house I want, everything's fixed up. When I'm good, then I'll be kind to other people.
This text would suggest otherwise.
We're going to have the band go ahead and come back up here as we close. I think that when Jesus says in verse 36,
"Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful,"
that actually sums all of this up really well.
What is mercy? Mercy is having compassion and kindness on someone whom it is within your power to punish. Our prayer today should be that God would help us to know in our minds and feel in our hearts the depths of the mercy he poured out on us in Christ so that we may reflect that mercy to the world around us.
Some of you need to consider that you are an enemy of Christ but that he died for you and he is welcoming you into his kindness. Some of you have basked in his kindness for years and not for a second thought about how you might reflect that kindness to other people.
If God would go so far as to die on the cross, then you can pray a blessing on a person that's cursed you. You can be kind to the people that make your heart race when we say words like enemy and abuser. The world can't do this. They can be kind to who's kind to them. Only the people of Christ can be kind to their enemies.
By God's grace, may we be a people who understand the mercy of God in our lives. And may this translate into us being merciful and kind to the world around us.