1 Samuel 8
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Transcript
My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. We are in the book of 1 Samuel, chapter 8. We are working our way through the book of 1 Samuel. So if you'll grab a Bible and go to chapter 8, that's where we'll be today.
Much of the book of 1 Samuel deals with the kingship in Israel. They have not had a king. The book is about the questions of will we have a king, how will we have a king, and who will be the king. A large portion of Samuel deals with that. We get into that today as this is where the process of inaugurating kingship in Israel begins.
We're going to read through all of chapter 8, and hopefully, as we see this, we'll learn a little bit about what's going on, a little bit about the hearts of the people, and be able to evaluate ourselves as well. So this is chapter 8, verse 1: "When Samuel became old"—so they had had a big victory and peace with the Philistines and the Amorites—"and Samuel had been judging over Israel, governing and leading, it says when Samuel became old he made his sons judges over Israel." The name of his firstborn son was Joel, and the name of his second, Abijah. They were judges in Beersheba.
Yet his sons did not walk in his ways but turned aside after gain. They took bribes and perverted justice. So his sons were not governing correctly. This is wickedness. It's wickedness anywhere. It's wickedness in Israel, where explicitly it's taught you're not allowed to do this—you can't take a bribe, can't pervert justice, can't turn your eyes away from what is right. But that's what they're doing. They're using their position for power. Now it's nice that Samuel hadn't. It says they're not doing what their dad had done, but their dad had been good, had done what he was supposed to, had been honest, and had integrity. But his sons aren't.
We also see Samuel repeating what Eli had done. Where Eli's sons were wicked, Samuel's sons are wicked. Eli had helped raise Samuel, and Samuel has repeated some of this same stuff. But the situation is not good.
Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and said to him, "Behold, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways." Which, I just think, "behold" makes it sound fancier, but if you translated it into South Carolina, it would be "look." So they go, "Look, you're old." Just like the start of this—they've all gathered together—they say, "Look, you're old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now appoint for us a king to judge us, like all the nations."
But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, "Give us a king to judge us." Samuel hears this and goes, "No, this isn't good. I don’t like this." And it's interesting to me because they do have a problem—the problem they have is that Samuel's old. His sons are judging them, and his sons aren't good. So that's going to be a problem; that's fair.
But there's more to that problem. The problem is that Samuel appointed those sons. So maybe one of the problems is that Samuel is bad at making appointments. The other problem is that Samuel, who's a judge, is just going to pass it along to his son. So maybe passing things down hereditarily isn't the best idea.
Do you see how their solution is dumb? Because they come to Samuel and they say, "You're not good at appointing people, and passing things along hereditarily doesn't seem great, so we'd like you to appoint a king so that can pass along his hereditary line." It's like y'all came up with a solution that fixes nothing. This is a bad plan. You just changed the name, but this isn't a good system.
But the response from Samuel is negative. The Hebrew literally says it was evil in his eyes—this is bad. The thing displeased Samuel when they said, "Give us a king to judge us." And Samuel prayed to the Lord, and the Lord said to Samuel, "Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them."
So it seems as if Samuel took it some as a rejection of him. He's bothered by it, hurt by it. And God says, "There's more going on here. It's not just that they're rejecting you—they're rejecting me. I was their king. They're rejecting me as king over them." So it's not just that they're getting rid of you—they're getting rid of me.
And then he says, verse 8: "According to all the deeds that they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt even to this day—forsaking me and serving other gods—so they are also doing to you." God just says, "Look, I've been dealing with these people for a long time. This is what they do. Now you're sharing in it, but they've done this the whole time." And he ties this idea of wanting a king to idolatry. They're getting rid of God to serve other gods; they're getting rid of you—they want a king. This is what they do. They're rejecting me as king over them.
If we just had 1 Samuel, I think we'd say, "Yeah, asking for a king was wrong. They weren't supposed to do that." But there's a problem, because in Deuteronomy, in the law they already had, there's a provision for getting a king. There's permission for getting a king. So there's got to be more going on here. It can't just be that they asked for a king and that's bad because they're allowed to ask for a king.
We're going to read that passage in just a second. So it has to be something underneath that which we understand can happen. Jesus says this about the Pharisees: they pray long prayers for show. You might say, "Well, prayer is good, so praying longer must be good." And Jesus goes, "Yeah, it's not the prayer; it's what's going on underneath that."
So when we see that they were allowed to ask for a king but this one is immediately both God and Samuel are like, "This is bad," is that there's something else going on underneath it.
Let's look at what Deuteronomy says and try to understand how the kingship should work and what it says about it. Then we'll come back to Samuel.
This is Deuteronomy 17, starting at verse 14: "When you come to the land that the Lord your God is giving you"—which happened in Joshua and Judges, they're in the land, it's happening in Samuel—they possess it and dwell in it, and then say, "I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me."
Okay, so when you find out, Deuteronomy says you can have a king. The next thing I would want to say from Samuel is, "Ah, but they said 'like all the nations,' and that's their problem." They might have been quoting Deuteronomy. So they slapped a Bible verse on this, or it was really prophetic—what was written in Deuteronomy is exactly what you're going to do.
But they're coming and saying, "We want a king like all the nations." So it can't just be that phrase. But we're going to see that Deuteronomy subverts that. It basically says, "You're going to ask for a king like all the nations, and I'll tell you what kind of king you can have." And then it's very different from the kings of all the nations.
Here's the type of king they're allowed to have: "You may indeed set a king over you whom the Lord your God will choose." So they're allowed to ask; God will pick somebody. So far, that seems like what they're doing. One from among your brothers you shall set as king over you. You may not put a foreigner over you who is not your brother.
Okay, that's pretty straightforward. I don't think that's any different from how the other nations work; he's just saying he's got to be an Israelite. Okay, so far, tracking.
Verse 16: "Only he must not acquire many horses for himself or cause the people to return to Egypt in order to acquire many horses, since the Lord has said to you, 'You shall never return that way again.'" So there are two things happening here. One, you're not allowed to go back to Egypt. The primary reason you'd want to go back to Egypt is to get horses. And you're not allowed to go get a bunch of horses—period.
What are horses good for? War. That's why a king wants many horses. You'll read in the Bible that the Israelites had a hard time because their enemies had many chariots—the war technology of the day. To have chariots, you needed horses and cavalry. So he says, "No, you can have a king, but he can't be trying to be powerful."
Next, "And he shall not acquire many wives for himself, lest his heart turn away." You can have a king, but he can't be trying to be powerful, and he can't want a bunch of women.
"Nor shall he acquire for himself excessive silver and gold." You all are familiar with what kings do—that's like their thing. "I want to be powerful; I want to be rich; bring out the women." That's kings forever, everywhere. So they say, "You want a king like the nations?" He goes, "You're allowed to have a king, and he can't be anything like the nations. He's not allowed to do all the basic king stuff."
Then he tells them what kind of king they're allowed to have: he can't be into warriors, women, or wealth.
Here's the type of king they can have: when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law approved by the Levitical priests. Here's what your king's going to do: he's not going to be rich or powerful; he can't have a lot of wives. But he does get to have the Levitical priests stand over him while he makes a hand copy of the Bible. If they don't like it, he starts over. This automatically puts the Levites above the king.
He's got to write his own copy of the Bible. Then it says, "And it shall be with him, and he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes and doing them."
You know who your king is—he's the one guy in the kingdom who owns his own version of the Bible, and he reads it every day. Everybody else, the Levites have them, but y'all have to go to him. This guy's got his own copy, and he's going to read it every day. That's your kind of king.
It then says, "That his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers." He's going to read the Bible every day so he doesn't think he's better than y'all. Like a poor king without an army and without a bunch of wives who reads his Bible every day and doesn't think he's better than anybody—that's the kind of king they're allowed to have.
"He may not turn aside from the commandment either to the right hand or to the left, so that he may continue long in his kingdom, he and his children in Israel." You can have a servant king who leads you in worshiping God. You can have a servant king who loves his Bible. That is the kind of king you can have.
This is not what they were getting at.
But it just dawned on me—ladies, this is excellent dating advice. He needs to be a brother. Find a Christian. Most women, for some reason, are attracted to the same things that you are attracted to in kings.
"I want him to be really powerful. I want him to be a womanizer. Or I want him to be rich." No. That's cute at first, but it gets bad later.
What you need is the dude who's got his own copy of the Bible, carries it everywhere, reads it, and does it.
So, when y'all are out in the world trying to find a man and you see a dude with his Bible who follows it, who's not super caring about all the women, he's not trying to be the most powerful aggressive dude, and not rich—isn't that the thing that's drawing you? Then you get to say, "That's a king right there."
Just letting y'all know. You're welcome.
Back to 1 Samuel. It says, "Now then obey their voice, only you shall solemnly warn them and show them the ways of the king who shall reign over them." So God is telling Samuel, "All right, they can have a king, but you have to tell them what they're about to pick because this is what they're about to pick. They're messing this up. You have to explain it to them."
They're allowed to ask for one. Presumably, they could have come and said, "Hey, you're old, and your sons are awful. We've been reading Deuteronomy and we'd like a king like this." But that's not what they do.
They come and say, "We want one like the nations," not the king like the nations we asked for. Then we're going to do the subversive one God laid out for us—not this humble Bible king but one like the nations. That's what they're asking for.
So he says, "Explain to them what that will look like."
Verse 10: So Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking for a king from him. He said, "These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you. He will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen and to run before his chariots."
Uh-oh, this king has a lot of horses. You guys, he's automatically got horses, horsemen, chariots. He broke rule number two. He's caring about power—that's all he's doing.
He says he will take your sons and appoint commanders of thousands and fifties, some to plow his ground, some to reap his harvest, and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots. He’s going to take and build up wealth and strength. That's what you're asking for.
He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers. He will take the best of your fields, vineyards, and olive orchards, and give them to his servants. He will take a tenth of your grain and vineyards and give it to his officers and servants. He will take your male servants, female servants, best young men, and donkeys, and put them to his work.
He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves.
He says he's going to take a tenth—you’re going to be his slaves. You all, that's the stuff that belonged to the Lord. They were to give all this to the Lord, to the Levites, and trust the Lord to protect and care for them. But he says, "You're bringing in a king who's going to claim it. He's going to claim your sons and daughters. You will be his slaves."
That's not how it was supposed to work. They were supposed to belong to the Lord, not to this guy. He says, "You're selling yourself to him. And in that day you will cry out because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves, but the Lord will not answer you in that day."
You’re picking this, and it's going to go poorly. This is what you want. Then you're going to go to the Lord and say, "Help us." And He’s going to say, "No, I gave you what you wanted."
Which is scary. There are times when we're so frustrated with the Lord that He won't just give us what we want. Can't we just believe He’s good and that sometimes the things we want are bad? There are times where the Lord gives you exactly what you want —and that is not a blessing; it's a curse. So we can trust the Lord even when it doesn't seem like things are working the way we want.
He just says, "You're going to head this direction. This is what's going to happen."
I want to show you this: Exodus 19, when He's making the people of Israel. He's bringing them out. He says, "Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, if you'll stick to the book, if you'll follow the law, 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."
So they were a kingdom, but not a kingdom with a king. They were a kingdom of priests. They did belong to somebody. They weren't slaves of a king. They were his treasured possession.
Do you know the system they had if they did it? They had Levites spread out that helped them know what was good and right and true. When they had issues, they would come, and the Levites would look in the law. If there was no clear answer, they could seek the Lord to give an answer to help go through disputes and fix things.
They had judges that would get raised up when there was a big problem—as long as they were repentant and faithful. We read this last week. They were before the Lord, fasting. They weren't ready for an army or war. God defended them, promising over and over that he would care for them and defend them, raise up judges.
Do you know judges only worked with volunteer armies? They said, "Who's with me? Let's go."
They didn't conscript people. When God was with a judge leading by the spirit, they won; God protected them. They didn't have taxes. Kings couldn't claim people, take donkeys, or slaves. The people were servants, and Levites were cared for by the people giving graciously to the Lord and to the system he set up.
They didn't have a king. They were to relate to God through the Levites. As long as they did that, God said, "I'll smash anyone who messes with you." And he did.
So they're coming and saying, "We don't want that system. We just want a dude to do this stuff."
But this is verse 19: "But the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel and said, 'No, there shall be a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations. And that our king may judge us and go before us and fight our battles.'"
That's key to understanding part of what's going on in their heart. What the problem is here.
So we're going to come back to that. Just want to finish reading this.
When Samuel heard all the words of the people, he repeated them in the ears of the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, "Obey their voice and make them a king." Samuel then said to the men of Israel, "Go every man to his city."
So Samuel's told, "No, give them a king. That's all they want to do." Then Samuel says, "All right, everybody go home." And maybe he said more, but that's all we get. That's the gist. Go home. And he's going to do it.
As it moves forward, we’ll see what happens.
But I want you to see what they're really asking for and what's happening here.
I've got—you know these are the problems here: they're going to be his slaves. They want him to judge them, which is govern, rule, tell them what's right and wrong, make decisions for them. They want him to go out and fight their battles. But throughout their history, God is the one who goes out and fights their battles.
Even with Gideon, at one point God tells Gideon, "You have too many people. Later, you’ll think you did this." So Gideon stands in front of his army and says, "Who here is scared?" And most of them go home. God says, "Still too many." He does this weird test to see who drinks like a dog. Those he takes. Then they win with lamps and yelling because God was fighting their battles.
This is what Joshua tells them: "One man puts to flight a thousand, since it is the Lord your God who fights for you, just as he promised."
So they said, "No, we want this guy to fight for us." And Samuel looked at them and said, "Y'all know it's your sons who are fighting, right? You're thinking this guy's going to fight, but he's going to take your kids, and they're going to fight for him. They won't have any choice."
They said, "We want him to judge us." But it was the Levites and God who judged them, choosing right and wrong, going to the scriptures. If the text said it, that's what they did. If something wasn't covered, they could inquire of the Lord.
They said, "No, we won't. We just want a guy to do it." But you're supposed to be the Lord's treasured possession, and they're like, "Nah, we'll just serve someone."
This is a problem.
I want to point out something that should resonate with us and that we should consider: what they wanted was a quick fix.
And y'all, don't you just want a quick fix? Don't you want something that just fixes it real fast? That's what I want. We love our American culture. We love quick fixes.
We're all about it. A tip, a trick, a hack. We love to know a guy: "Is there just a guy who can do that? Do we know a guy?" "I got a guy," but I can't tell you about my guy because then he'd be your guy and I can't do you.
We do this. We want just a technique, a difference. They're like, "Ah, these judges aren't working. Let's call them kings. Just change the technique."
We love data. We're going to find the best way. We're going to figure out what the right answer is. We're going to read the right book, and that'll give us the right system.
How many books have you read that gave you a system, and you found out later you had to do the system? It was a nice technique, but you actually needed diligence and stamina and personal growth. Not doing that.
Let me get on Instagram and see if someone else can tell me something that sounds nice, and I'll pretend to do this for a week.
Do y'all realize that what they need is growth? What they need is development. What they need is a relationship with the Lord. What they need is to be diligent in what he's already given them.
They don't need a new technique. They don't need a quick fix. This isn't going to solve the problem.
They're like, "Let him fight the battles." But those are going to be your kids. You're not even thinking this through.
How much do we just want a trick or a pill or a TED talk, or is there just something that'll fix it?
We actually just need to grow as people, repent, develop.
Yeah, I like books. I read books. I got a stack of books I plan to read this year. I'm in the middle of reading four books because I apparently can't read one at a time. I'm all over the place. But you just need this one, right? If you're going to try to navigate romance and marriage or money, parenting, leading a household, or work—you really just need this one. You can pick up a tip or trick here and there. You can hear what some psychologist says about a good way to talk to kids or whatever. That's fine. Anything helpful is helpful. But you still got to do it, and you still got to do it as a person who looks like they belong to Jesus.
Some things that psychologists say are dumb. Just because a therapist said it... I meet a person, and I'm like, "Okay, do they know the Lord? Do they love the Bible? Or are they stupid?" I mean, you could just be getting stuff Marks made up? Marks good? Maybe. But not Marks—that's not who I was looking for! Who am I looking for? Freud, thank you. That's who I was looking for.
We can take shots at Marks, too, but I wasn't meaning to do that today.
Do you know what I mean? Like, what are we doing? You just need your own copy that you read every day, so you don't turn to the right or to the left.
They wanted a quick fix, but the Bible gives us everything we need for life and godliness—everything we need to navigate all the stuff we've got going on.
So if you're like, "I don't know if I've read the right books," just keep reading this one.
There's another thing going on here I think we need to consider.
When they came and made this request, they were trying to swap God out. And I think we can do the same thing as long as we keep him out of these categories.
We can just have something that fits in those categories for us.
We've got a king that we're serving, and I think there are a lot of things that can fit those categories.
I want to take a second for you to consider. I'm going to give you some examples, and we're going to consider them this morning:
What gets your best? What are you a slave to? What do you serve? What gets your best effort? What gets your energy? What drives you? So you're a slave to it, not the Lord.
It makes your decisions. How do you know what's right and good? Which one saves us money? Which one makes us more money? How do you know which job to take? It's real easy—skim to the bottom. How much are they paying? Should I move? I don't know. Are they going to pay more?
Your whole life pulled around by money. "Should we go here? Should we not? Should I have this? Should I not?"
It's just based on money. So it governs you. It's your judge.
How do you know you're safe?
How do you know you're winning? That's easy: it's a dollar amount in a bank.
"I know I'm winning in life because I made more money this year than last year."
So we can do that with money.
We can do that with romance. You can be a slave to a relationship, and you can say, "Well, marriage is good. Romance is good. This stuff is fine."
Yeah. We can ask for a king.
Where's your heart? How's that working?
Some people follow Jesus until they get a boyfriend or girlfriend, and then they're willing to sin with them.
Who's your master? Who are you a slave to?
What's getting your best?
Does it govern your life? Is that how you make decisions?
"I'll change this. I'll change anything as long as I can stay in a relationship."
As long as I can have my romantic life work out.
It doesn't have anything to do with what the Bible says or what I ought to do or not do.
Where I ought to go or not go, what's right or wrong.
I'm not trusting the word; I'm just trusting this will keep me in or get me out of a relationship.
How do you know you're winning? How do you know you're safe? "I only feel okay when I'm in a relationship."
That's how I know I'm okay as a person. That's how I know I'm safe, as long as someone is here and loves me, and says they love me, and I'll do whatever as long as it's that.
Children—children are a blessing from the Lord.
But there's a way that they get your best.
When they're little, they get everything. You get used to that because that's part of what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to care for your children, right? The Bible says to.
But there's a way where they get your devotion. They get your heart, and the Lord doesn't. You say, "Well, my kids don't govern my life."
Well, is your whole schedule built around what league they want to be in? Did you pick your neighborhood based on your children? Did you move to another part of the city based off your children? Did you pick your church based off your children?
It's possible they're the judge that sets what's right and wrong, good and bad, for you.
You're not following the Lord. You're not studying the word.
Having children who are following the Lord with you is one thing, but if they're setting the pace, how do you know you're okay? How do you know you're safe?
"How do I know I'm winning? As long as my kids turn out okay, I'll know."
Oh my gosh, that's a lot of pressure on your children. "Hey, I need you to save me." That's rough. It's not good for you or for them.
You can put happiness there. You can put anything you want. There could be a whole thing that decides those things for us.
"How do you decide what's right or wrong? Well, this made me unhappy, so I know it's wrong. This makes me happy, so I know it's right."
God wants us to be happy. Yes, ultimately endlessly happy in him—not short-term, unrepentantly, sinfully happy. Not at all.
He hates that so much that he would die for it. Jesus died for it.
But he also loves you so much and desires your happiness so much that he died for it.
He might rescue you and make you part of him.
But that's not a way to judge your life.
That's what four-year-olds do, but that’s not what we're to do.
“How do you know you’re okay? How do you know you’re safe? How do you know you’re winning?”
“As long as I feel good?”
That’s insanity.
What Samuel and God want in this passage is for God to be king.
What Deuteronomy wants is a king who loves the Lord as primary, who humbles himself, and serves his brothers.
And both of those hopes and wishes are fulfilled in Christ.
Jesus is God who came as king to humble himself, to serve his brothers, to be the incarnate Word who carried it around everywhere, did not lift himself above his brothers, but died for them so they might be welcomed.
Do you understand that the hope of Deuteronomy, the hope of Samuel, and our collective hope is found in Christ alone?
That’s the kind of king we want.
That’s who we want to be a treasured possession of.
That’s who we want judging us and leading us.
That’s how we want to know who’s fighting our battles and caring for us—Christ and Christ alone.
So we’re going to take communion and celebrate that.
That’s the king we have, who loved, served, rescued, humbled himself to bring his brothers to life and hope, who cares for us, fights our battles, and whom we can trust when things aren’t going the way we want.
But I want you to take a second.
The band’s going to come up and begin to play.
I want you to take a second and ask yourself those questions:
What’s getting my best?
What am I using to make the big decisions in my life?
Is it prayer? Is it church family? Is it the Word? Or is it something else?
How do I tell myself I’m winning? How do I tell myself I’m safe? How do I know I’m okay?
I want you to repent. Talk to the Lord and say, "I don’t want this king. I want you to be my king."
Then take communion and celebrate that you have a good king.
If you are not a Christian, Christ is for you.
Communion is not something for outsiders. It's a celebration where we remind ourselves that his body was broken, his blood was shed, and we have hope in him and him alone.
If you're not a Christian, you don’t know that yet, you don’t understand that yet.
What I would say is: you get to evaluate your life and say, "Yeah, Jesus isn’t my king, but I want him to be because he’s good, forgiving, and there’s hope."
We would love to baptize you, to celebrate that publicly, and then you can take communion.
Let’s pray.
Lord Jesus, you are a good king.
We ask that by the power of your Spirit, by the truth of your Word, all usurping kings would be removed from thrones today.
That everything else that sits in our hearts to judge, defend, to protect us, that claims it can fight our battles, everything that we are slaves to, that gets our best, and that we submit ourselves to—Lord, may you rule and reign over our hearts.
May we repent, may we come to you in forgiveness and mercy, and may we serve and follow you all the days of our lives.
May your name be praised. Amen.
1 Samuel 7:3-17
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Uh my name is Chad. I'm one of the pastors here. If you will grab a Bible and go to First Samuel, chapter 7. We are working through the book of First Samuel. And we're going to study uh almost all of chapter 7.
We got into chapter 7 a little bit last week. We're going to study almost all of chapter 7 today. And we're going to see in this story something that is absolutely essential to our faith in Christ. absolutely essential to how we live and what we do as Christians as we follow him. Um if you don't have a Bible with you, you can grab one of the blue ones in front of you.
It will be on page 132 this morning. Um but we're going to study through this. We're going to read through the story and then we're going to kind of go back through and begin to point out some aspects uh that we need to consider this morning as we look at ourselves and as we learn from this story. So 1st Samuel 7 verse three uh well before I read verse three. What just happened was the ark was sent back to the people of Israel.
It was taken over to Kir Jerim and it's been there for 20 years. That's what we just read last week. So the remember they hooked it to some cows and they sent it back. Okay.
Uh, it's back, but it's been there for 20 years. And it says that the house of Israel lamented after the Lord. Verse three, and Samuel said, Samuel's back. We hadn't talked about him in a while, and it's been 20 years in the text. You're like, we talked about him a couple weeks ago.
Yeah, but he what has he been doing for 20 years? But Samuel shows back up. He had been established as a prophet. He begins to speak. It says, "And Samuel said to all the house of Israel, if you are returning to the Lord with all your heart, then put away the foreign gods and the ash to wroth from among you, and direct your heart to the Lord and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines." It is possible that Samuel lived in relative obscurity for 20 years and then suddenly started saying this.
I find that very unlikely. I think what is most likely is that they just summed up what Samuel has been saying for 20 years. And some of y'all thought that we went through the book of Exodus slowly. Samuel's on the first commandment for 20 years. He's saying the same thing over and over again for 20 years.
It says they're lamenting after the Lord. It says he goes around and says to all of Israel. Well, if you're really going to turn to him, get rid of your idols. If you're really going to turn to him, get rid of your idols. I think at some point people might say, you say the same thing over and over again.
And he'd say, "You haven't done it yet. I don't have any. We can't do step two if we hadn't done step one." I think maybe that's what his attitude was like. We'll see. Anyway, it says he went around.
He told everybody. Verse four, so the people of Israel put away the baales and the asharoth and they served the Lord only. They listen. They get rid of their idols. So him speaking to all Israel, calling them to repent, calling them to turn from this stuff, they do.
Then Samuel said, "Gather all Israel at Mispa and I will pray to the Lord for you." So he says, "If y'all are really doing this and they're really going to follow the Lord, then everybody come together and we'll pray and we'll see if he'll throw off the hand of the Philistines as we turn to him." So they gathered at Mispa and drew water and poured it out before the Lord and fasted on that day. Okay. So, they gather to fast. They gather to mourn. It says they drew water and they pour it out.
Now, there's nowhere in the Bible in the law or anything that tells them to do that, but it seems to be an act of contrition. It's part of the fasting. Water is hard to come by. Even if they had a close source, a lot of their day would be spent going and getting it, carrying it, hauling it. It's a precious thing and it represents life and fruitfulness.
Without water, crops don't grow. Without water to drink, you die. And they pour it out. Saying, "Lord, you're our life. You're the one we're trusting to bring fruitfulness.
You're the one we're trusting with hope." That they pour it out and they fast. So, they're not seems like they're not drinking. They're not eating. They're humbling themselves before the Lord. says if they fasted on that day and said there we have sinned against the Lord.
So they're acknowledging that they're wrong and they've come to humble themselves and Samuel judged the people of Israel at Mispa. Uh judging does mean at times that he would go in between disputes that judges would do that sort of thing. But most of the time in the text, what it really it's a almost a title for leads. So you'll see the judges in the book of judges are Israel's leaders. And sometimes they just win a decisive victory and then Israel has peace and they'll say they were a judge for that period of time.
It does seem like at times they'll sit and they'll help you work through disputes or help answer questions about what someone should do or not do. But a lot of times it's just kind of like chief. So he was judge over them. He gathered them all. They came.
He's overseeing it. Verse 7. Now when the Philistines heard that the people of Israel had gathered at Mispa, the lords of the Philistines went up against Israel. And the people of Israel heard of it and they were afraid of the Philistines. Okay, couple things happening here.
The people of Israel seem like they've been at Mispa for a while, which makes sense. Uh, this is why people used to always have really good guest areas in their homes. When someone travels, we're we're the only people because of cars that'll go do something for a day or a couple hours and go back. That's not how this works. People went to a place, they were there for a little while because it took a while to get there.
It takes a while to get back. These are things that are happening. So, they're there lamenting, fasting before the Lord, humbling themselves, and the Philistines hear about it. And the Philistines say, "Oh, y'all want to fight?
We'll fight. Yeah. Okay. It's go time. They said, "Do you hear all the Israelites gathered?" Yeah.
All right. Well, we better go kill them before they kill us. That's what they did. And if you're going, "But why?" Cuz they gathered to worship. Have Have you ever been out somewhere and heard people laughing?
or you've been walking and you pass a group of like middle schoolers and you get past them and they laugh and you have this moment where you think they're laughing at me. If you will assign evil motives to happy people in your vicinity, this is the same human impulse just on a national scale with people who were their enemies. They've been at war. All of Israel has gathered. They go, "That can't be good.
we better kill them. So, the Philistines get ready and start marching. Now, the Israelites have not gathered for war. So, they're afraid and rightfully so.
The Philistines have been beating them. The Philistines have been in some ways exerting rule over them. We find out in chapter 13 of 1st Samuel that the Philistines had so much authority over the Israelites, they wouldn't let them have blacksmiths because they said if they have blacksmiths, they might make swords and they might make spears. So if you were an Israelite and you wanted to get your sickle sharpened or your axe sharpened, you had to go to the Philistines to get it done because you didn't have a blacksmith. So if there are weapons in the camp of the Israelites, their farm tools now with a camp, they probably would have brought some axes and some different things.
Maybe not sickles, but they might have had some things so they could have a camp here. But there's not a lot. They didn't show up for war. They show up to fast. These are thirsty, hungry people who have come together to to lament and to humble themselves before the Lord.
They did not gather for war. So they show up and all of a sudden they hear and it's it's women, children, everybody. And they go, "Oh no, this isn't good. The Philistines are marching down on us." So they were afraid of the Philistines. And the people of Israel said to Samuel, "Do not cease to cry out to the Lord our God for us that he may save us from the hand of the Philistines." So they don't flee.
Seems like they found out about the Philistines when the Philistines are getting there. They don't flee. They say, "Pray." So Samuel, verse 9, So Samuel took a nursing lamb and offered it as a whole burnt offering to the Lord. And Samuel cried out to the Lord for Israel. And the Lord answered him.
And then it's going to go into telling the story. It's going to tell us how the Lord answered him. But it changes focus for a second. Says, "The Lord answered him." Verse 10. As Samuel was offering up the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to attack Israel.
So, this is a massive gathering gathering of Israelites and there's an army marching down on them. And they are praying and worshiping and saying, "Samuel, pray." He's offering a sacrifice as that is happening. And as they are marching in, but the Lord thundered with a mighty sound that day against the Philistines and threw them into confusion, and they were defeated before Israel. And the men of Israel went out from Mispa and pursued the Philistines and struck them as far as below Bethar. What?
The Philistines are drawing up military ranks to attack a bunch of Israelites who are not ready for that. If there are some people who have started to gather to face off against them, if they have weapons, we're talking sticks, staffs, axes, maybe a sickle, cuz you know there's probably that guy who brought that, you know. And somebody was like, "Why do you have that?" And you're like, "You never know." It's like, "But okay." Then the Philistines were coming. You're like, "Man, I should have brought my sickle. Look at this dude." Prepper.
All right. Good for him. It's about to be a massacre. And then it says that God thunders from heaven and throws them into confusion. We are thankfully blessed to be relatively um protected from the elements, but there are times when you're out or when a storm is right over your house.
You ever had that time where lightning strikes the same time thunder goes off and everybody goes, "Okay, that's just a normal storm. God's just raining. He's not even mad at everybody." So, what he does here is terrifying. that he thunders viciously, ferociously, powerfully from heaven at the Philistines. And the Philistines knew about Egypt.
They they already knew about that when the the ark went. Now, these Philistines would have known about the ark. That was an ark. It was a a box that defeated them. They got defeated by a box because God's in charge of the box.
It went to all they did a little circuit of getting their tails whipped by a box earlier in Samuel. And I'm not trying I don't I'm not trying to speak slow u irreverently about the ark of the covenant. So So don't hear that. And I forgive me if that's the way that came across. But I'm saying that it wasn't an army.
It was the power of God. They they would know that thunder comes from heaven. And a whole bunch of them just say, "Nope. No, no, no, no, no, no, no." And their lines break. And it says they're thrown into confusion.
So somebody's yelling, "Charge." Somebody yells yelling, "Retreat." People are dropping weapons. Horses are running into each other. It's a mess. The Israelites go win. They're so confused.
The Israelites are winning. And I think getting more wellarmed as they go. A guy who started off with a stick gets a sword, then a helmet, takes his time, puts on some new shoes. By the time they're getting to Beth's car, they're tearing these guys up. And y'all, it was such a complete victory.
It says that it subdues the Philistines. It's going to tell us that in verse 13. Verse 12. Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mispa and Shin and called its name Ebenezer. For he said, "Till now the Lord has helped us." Ebenezer means stone of help.
So he sets up right in the middle of that victory a big stone and says, "The Lord has helped us." The song we sang earlier, we sang, "Here I raise my Ebenezer. Hither by thy help I've come." It's talking about this passage. So if your only interaction with Ebenezer was Ebenezer Scrooge, you have a new one. First Samuel means stone of help. That's what they set up.
It's a monument that says, "The Lord brought me here." That's why we sang that. Verse 13. So the Philistines were subdued and did not again enter the territory of Israel. Somebody was like, "Y'all want to go attack him again?" And somebody else was like, "Shut up.
I'm not going back over there." And the hand of the Lord was against the Philistines all the days of Samuel. The cities that the Philistines had taken from Israel were restored to Israel from Echron to Gath and Israel delivered their territory from the hand of the Philistines. So they push back, reclaimed land. The Philistines are knocked back. And this is written very much the way the judge stories are written in the book of Judges.
There's one decisive victory and then it just says things went well from there. underneath Samuel's leadership. There was peace also between Israel and the Amorites. The Amorites don't show up in 1 Samuel much. It's not much of a conflict.
It just says, "And this was also going well." So that's nice. Verse 15, Samuel judged Israel all the days of his life. And he went on a circuit year by year to Bethl, Gilgal and Mispa. And he judged Israel in all these places. Then he would return to Rama for his home was there, which is where his family was from.
So he does at some point go get reconnected. He is around his family, his parents, for his home was there, and there also he judged Israel. And he built there an altar to the Lord. Those places are not very far from each other. It would be like saying he traveled and would do a yearly circuit from Casey to Lexington to Irmo and to Chapen, but then he would head back to Casey because he lived in Casey.
It's not it's not a big area, but they don't travel as well as we do and as easily as we do. So, he just moves from place to place and seems like he sets up in kind of a different area and works his way back, but he's overseeing Israel from that location, which is pretty centrally located. That's it. The story is going to shift into something else as we move forward. We're going to jump ahead again.
We're just told there's 20 years where Samuel was declaring this message and then there's this section of his life where there's peace. But what we see in this text, which is important for us to take up and to consider this morning, is that in this text, we see a beautiful picture of repentance. we see the essential elements of repentance that in this text we're able to see what belongs to repentance. Now if you're a Christian repentance matters to you. It's how you become a Christian.
Martin Luther calls it the first fruit of faith. So when we genuinely begin to have faith, the first thing that happens is repentance. And if you're not a Christian, repentance is very important for you because in the book of Acts, they begin to proclaim that God has now commanded all people everywhere to repent. So that the Bible comes to you with a message of repentance. But it's important for us to know what does that mean?
It's possible you're here today and your only real interaction with repentance is TV shows making fun of someone holding a sign who looks crazy in a city going repent. And you know it's something that that guy yelled and something that you should do but maybe you don't have a good handle on what does that mean. So what we're going to do is we're going to walk through the key elements of it. If you're a Christian I want you to look at yourself. I want you to consider your approach to repentance.
I want you to consider, do does this show up in the way I'm turning to the Lord? And if you're not a Christian, I want you to hear what is asked of you, what is called of you as you come to the Lord. Now, we're going to go through them in the order they show up in the text. And it's not in any particular order. It's not like this one comes first.
These are all parts of repentance. And in the Bible, sometimes the text will just say repent. It'll just say confess. It'll just say believe and be baptized. And all of this is baked into that.
And that's why it's not really an order doesn't matter as much as that it all is a part of it. Okay. First one, repentance is from the heart. So this is verse three. He says, if you are returning to the Lord with all your heart, he's going to say to direct their heart.
But repentance is from the heart. is something that you feel that you experience et internally. It's not just a thought process. It's not just uh understanding some new facts about a thing but it's something that happens in us that our heart is changing. When the Bible talks about the heart, it's talking about the the seat of our will of our decision making.
So there's something that happens inside of us that we're changed internally that we see his goodness. It's one of the things I was blessed and encouraged by as we're celebrating baptism which is the step after repentance. You you repent, you place faith, and then you're baptized. They're articulating how good the Lord is, how kind he is, how merciful he is, how he's loving. But when we see that, when we see his goodness, we see our sin.
That's why Peter is on the boat with Jesus. Jesus tells him to cast his nets over here. They cast, they begin to pull all these fish up. Peter quits pulling them up, falls down and says, "Please get off my boat. I'm a sinful man." Because he brushed against holiness.
He saw his wickedness. And it happens inside of us. That we're changed internally. That our hearts are broken over. This is what Psalm 51 says.
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. A broken and contrite heart, oh God, you will not despise. He's saying that God doesn't just want sacrifices from us. Like he wants our labor like we can pay him off like that. You can show up to God and go, "Okay, how big do you want the check to be?" He says, "No, but if your heart's broken over your sin," he won't despise that.
If you come to him and say, "I need mercy," then you'll receive mercy. If you come to him and say, "I need forgiveness," and you'll receive forgiveness. That it's a broken and contr contrite heart that he will not despise. When Peter preaches in Acts chapter 2, it says that they heard it. They were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, "What shall we do?" And this is where repentance begins.
that's in our hearts that there is no repentance where our hearts are unaffected. There's two Puritans I want to quote because they thought deeply about these things and I think they uh distilled it nicely. Jonathan Edwards says this, "The sorrow of the soul for sin is the first genuine feeling that accompanies the awakened conscience. God shows up and wakes you up to him. You feel your sin and you have sorrow over it.
Richard Baxter, he says, "He who doth," and doth just means does this context, "He who does not grieve over his sin does not know the weight of it." So if in your life you would say, "I'm a Christian." But you haven't grieved your sin, you haven't seen your sin, you haven't had sorrow over your sin, your heart hasn't been broken over your wickedness, you haven't come to the place where you said, "If he doesn't show me mercy, I'm in trouble." And maybe you just know some stuff about Jesus, but you've never really interacted with him. So I would ask, has your heart changed? Have you felt the work of the spirit in you? Have you come to the moments when you realize, I'm despicable without the grace of God?
That's the first thing. Repentance is from the heart. Not first in order, first in. We're talking about it today. I said these were in no particular order and then I said first a bunch.
So second thing today we turn from our sin. We turn from sin. He says if your heart's coming to the Lord then put away the foreign gods. And in verse four it says so the people put away. You change.
If you're genuinely repenting life changes. That's a part of it. It's not the only part of it. You can't just clean yourself up. You can't just fix yourself.
But it is a part of it. That if someone just says, "Well, I'll just do all the things and then God will owe me." That's incorrect. But if someone says, "Well, I'm saved by grace, so I can do whatever I want." That's also incorrect. Your heart changes. Your appetites change.
Your desires change. And you stop some stuff. You've spent your whole life in rebellion to God, pursuing sin. And if you're genuinely following Jesus, you put it away. And this shows up all over the New Testament.
When John the Baptist is preaching repentance, he tells them to bear fruit in keeping with repentance, which means look like you've repented. And they ask how. And he tells them specific things to do to different people. It shows up differently in different people. When Jesus is with Zakius in that story, Zakius is a tax collector.
Jesus is with him and then he stands up and says,"Lord, I'm going to pay back everybody I've robbed. I'm going to who I've defrauded. I'm going to pay him back four-fold and then I'm going to give half of my goods to the poor." And Jesus says, "Salvation has come to this house today." And he doesn't mean, "Wow, you wrote a big enough check." That's not what he's saying. He's saying that because what Zakius's repentance reached his heart, then it reaches his hands, shows up. If you have repentance and you're genuinely following the Lord, but it hadn't made it to your wallet, it hasn't made it to your time, it hasn't made it to the way you speak to people or about people, it hasn't made it to what you watch and listen to, that it hadn't shown up.
And I don't know if salvation's reached your house because change comes with repentance that we are to put some things away. In the book of Acts, there's a whole bunch of people who are becoming Christians and it says they came forward confessing and divulging their practices. And they started saying, "I've been practicing magic. I've been doing pagan rituals." And they get together and they start burning their books. and then says someone wrote down how expensive it was and it's an insane amount.
They got rid of it. Some of you have some things you need to burn. Somebody in my group sent all the guys in our group a video of them flushing something down the toilet. There's some things you need to get out of your house. Some script some subscriptions you need to change.
Some of you need to get uh not have a smartphone. Someone says, "What kind of phone is that?" You say, "It's a flip phone." And they say, "Why?" You say, "Cuz I love Jesus." and also mind your own business. There's some things that should change. John Calvin, one of the reformers, he says, "Repentance is not merely a change of mind, but a change of the whole life in so far is as it is a turning of the heart to God." Your life changes as your heart changes. Repentance is not just you believing some new facts, but it shows up in your life.
And so I would say I would ask, are you a Christian? If you said yes, I would ask, has your whole life changed? Or do you look the same? Do you still care about the same things?
Still chase the same things? Is there fight in you when you see that? Do you hate it? Do you continue to turn?
Do you continue to put it away? I'm not articulating at all that Christians are perfect. Far from it. But Christians hate sin and fight against it. It shows up.
Is repentance for you? Just when your group does care night, you show up and say the same things you've been saying, but you hadn't changed one bit of a habit. You could almost just go, "Well, you know what I'd say next?" But there's no heart of sorrow and there's no change in life. In repentance, we turn from sin. In repentance, we turn to the Lord.
He says, "And direct your heart to the Lord and serve him only." Put away the false idols. Turn direct your heart towards the Lord. This is something that we do intentionally. I like that he has an action verb in here. Direct your heart.
Aim yourself. That's one of the things that happens in repentance is we turn ourselves towards the Lord. It happens naturally as he changes our appetites. And it happens as we fight. And y'all, your desire to fight from the Lord is fight for the Lord is from the Lord.
I've had people sit in my office before and they go, "I just want to please the Lord. I just want to love him. And I'm so sinful. I just want to follow him. And I keep chasing all this stuff.
I just I just want him. And I I can't." And then so often they'll say, "Do you think I'm a Christian? Am I even a Christian?" And I'll say, "You know, only Christians just want to follow the Lord. I've never once had someone who hated Jesus be like, I just love to follow him." That pain that you're feeling over, I want I want him. I want to follow him and I'm I just feel.
He's like, "Yeah, Paul wrote about that." But that's part of it that we want him. When we say Jesus is better than everything else, we're not blowing smoke. We believe it. That's not a cute slogan. It's a it's an eternal reality.
And he actually is better. He doesn't just show up and say, "Hey, you know all that stuff that used to make you happy? Get rid of it." and then not replace it with something of eternal glorious value, real delight, real pleasure, real joy, real peace, real satisfaction. He shows up and says, "Oh, he's so much better." Have you directed your heart towards the Lord?
Did you become a Christian? Show up on Sundays and be like, I don't want to sing. And then you were like, all right, then we're supposed to. I see. Now, I read Colossians.
He says, too. Okay. So, you start singing like this. And then you start singing a little more. You start singing a little more and you show up and you're like, I want to sing to the Lord.
Some of you said, I don't like reading. Have you grown to where if you don't read your Bible, you miss it? Some of you are like, if I hear y'all say community group one more time, I'm going to try to assault someone. And you were like, I'm awkward. They're awkward.
I'm annoying. They're annoying. I don't want to be there. But you go, you started going. You've been around.
you go out go out of town for two weeks and you miss these people. Has that happened to you? Has your heart begun to change? Because I'll tell you, if you say, "I love Jesus, but you don't need to be a part of a Church. You don't need that.
You don't need to be around Christians. You don't need that. You don't need to sing to Jesus. Not my thing. You don't need to read the Bible.
No, I don't know. I could go. I don't know. I hadn't picked up a Bible. I hadn't opened a Bible in six months." I would just every once in a while I'll talk to my wife in the evening.
Wait till I finish the story. Sometimes I'll talk to my wife in the evening and I'll say, "What did you have for lunch?" Oh, I talk to her a lot. Every once in a while this conversation happens. I hear it. I hear it now.
That makes sense. She talks to me more All right. Every once in a while, I'll talk to her and I'll say, 'What did you have for lunch?' And she'll go, "I don't I didn't have lunch today. I don't think I had lunch today." And I have this thought. Your relationship to food is so different from my relationship to food.
If I haven't had lunch, something happened. Or I'm plotting on supper and I want to be double hungry. But I've thought about food. I hadn't just let food slip by. I'll stop thinking about my children to eat food.
She'll be like, "Is the baby crying?" I'm like, "I'm eating a sandwich. I know where he's located. I can hear him. Can you go a long time without thinking about the Lord, without caring, without noticing?
Just doesn't show up. Oh, I don't know. I guess I hadn't been around. I guess I hadn't showed up on Sunday. I guess I hadn't been around a group.
I guess I hadn't opened my Bible. God, I don't know the last time I prayed. But boy, I love Jesus. Do you?
Cuz that's not how it works. If you asked me, "How's your wife?" And I was like, "Oh gosh, I hadn't seen her in two months." She's probably fine, though. I guess I really love her. You'd be like, "Wife, you're suspect number one, man. Do you notice?
Do you think that Christ, the most glorious, wonderful, delightful, who without whom we cannot exist, for whom the whole world exists, that if you really knew him, you could go without noticing that he was missing from your life? Look in the text. Look in the Bible and say that that's shows up here. That that's what happens to people who come to know it. In repentance, we turn to the Lord.
Our hearts change and they're directed to him. It does take some energy. It does take some fight. But it also is something that we become dependent on and we thirst for. And without it, we feel like nothing.
Fourth one, repentance requires confession. The fourth thing we should note from this text, if you'll look down to verse six, says, "They gathered at Mispa and drew water and poured it out before the Lord and fasted on that day and said there, we have sinned against the Lord." When you turn in repentance, you are acutely aware of your sin. You're acutely aware of what it is, what it is that disqualifies you, what it is that makes you soiled and dirty and unclean. and we confess. We get rid of it.
When John the Baptist was baptizing, it says they came to him to be baptized confessing their sins. When they're burning their books in Acts 19, it says that they divulge their practices. They confess them. James commands us to confess our sins to one another. That's not some sort of we have to have a a priest that has to hear it and then they talk to God.
No, we have one mediator between us and God. We get to talk directly to God and we ought to confess directly to God. But one of the other things that we get to do is unbburden ourselves from hiding sin. Sin is like mold. It grows in the dark.
And we are to be people who confess, bring things into the light, and in our confession find freedom. Y'all, they gathered to publicly confess. This is something we do. and more so than the Israelites because we have a perfect savior who if we confess our sins is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. I tell my group sometimes that I always feel like confession is kind of like throwing up.
Every time right before I'm going to throw up, I feel like I might be about to die and it's the worst thing ever. And I feel the exact same way before I'm going to confess things. This is going to be the worst thing ever. After I throw up, I'm like, "That was great. I should do that more often.
I feel wonderful. I'm going back to sleep or whatever." Like, you just feel good after you. And that's the way I feel after confession. I finally share this. And sometimes sometimes the Lord is tightening down on me to where I'm going to confess.
He he's it's coming. That is also similar to throwing up. You can't just be like, "I was going to, but then I stopped." That's not how it works. There are times where the Lord presses something out and then the people around me act like they know Jesus, too. The Christians around me act like they they need Christ, too.
And then I get to realize that my worth and my value doesn't come from my behavior. It doesn't come from my ability to be good. It doesn't come from people's assessment of me. It comes from Christ who forgives my sin. Do you confess?
Do you repent? When you repent, do you repent specifically? My boys sometimes I'll say, "Tell your brother you're sorry." I'm sorry. I'll say, "For what?" I want them to articulate. I want to see if they know.
When you when you confess, when you repent, do you say what it is? Do you just say, "I'm sorry?" Do you say, "I'm sorry that I did this in this way?" I had somebody recently come to me and they said, "Hey, in the conversation we just had, I need to I need to repent to you. I need to confess something." And they articulated what was going on behind the way they were wording things. I never would have known, but they said, "The Lord convicted me I shouldn't be angling the conversation that way for that reason." That's what Christians do. We get to be free from sin.
We get to articulate what's happened. Do you only confess when you're caught? Do you only confess the details you think they already know? Or do you hate your sin and bring it into the light because Jesus is good?
Is there something right now that the spirit is pressing on you and you're thinking, "Well, I can't share that. I can't say that. Everything will change. Everything will fall apart if I just if I share that. I've got to hold on to that." Say, "Trust him.
He's good." Fifth one, final one. Repentance seeks forgiveness. Forgiveness requires sacrifice. The point of repentance is to receive forgiveness, to seek forgiveness. But repentance, forgiveness requires sacrifice.
Verse 9. So Samuel took a nursing lamb and offered it as a whole burnt offering to the Lord. And Samuel cried out to the Lord for Israel and the Lord answered him. He sacrifices a lamb. They confess their sin.
He kills a nursing lamb. Have y'all seen lambs? They're cute. This woman was still dependent on its mother. This is precious and it has to die.
Hebrews 9 indeed under the law almost everything is purified with blood and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins as we come in repentance do you know that blood has to be shed for us to be forgiven I think sometimes we read these stories and we go oh man that's so feels so backward feel so tribal feels so whatever that they thought that they needed to have a sacrifice y'all we think we need to have a sacrifice we do in Christ who shed his blood for us. But we still believe in blood atonement. It's just Christ, not animals. It's something that can last forever. It's something that has much more significance and value and worth so that he can pay for all of our sins.
But forgiveness requires sacrifice. It requires blood. So that if you say, "Well, I'm repenting, but you're just talking to the Lord and you're not talking to Jesus. If you're repenting but you're not trusting in Christ, then you don't have a sacrifice and there is no forgiveness. This is Luke 24.
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 the nations. The hope of repentance is forgiveness. Forgiveness is purchased through blood. Jesus suffered and rose. And there is a repentance for the forgiveness of sins proclaimed in the name of Jesus.
He's our hope. And just like in this story, it is effective for salvation. God thunders from the heavens. Well, our God came down. He died.
He rose. He rules from the heavens. And he says that all who will come to him in repentance will be forgiven. Do you see your sin?
Do you know your wickedness? Do you know you are unclean? Do you have sorrow over your brokenness? Do you feel an inability to love the Lord as you ought?
Do you want to be forgiven? Can I tell you that you can be in Christ and you will be washed and you will be free. Nobody stood up here today and said, "I wanted to declare that this is my next step in the road to awesomeness and self-actualization." If they did, they would not be allowed in. This is I was in my sin. I'm buried in my sin.
And I rise because Christ rose. Christ died for my sin. He was buried. I'm buried with him. He rises to new life.
I rise to new life. and I'm washed clean and it's effective for salvation. When we come to the Lord and say, "I need you to give me mercy." He gives mercy. "I need you to rescue me," he rescues. "I need you to forgive me," he forgives.
And we're forgiven. The reason we walk in continued repentance is not because we've suddenly lost our salvation and need it again. It's because we have the joy and the delight of salvation and sin gets in the middle of it. And so, we say, "Lord, continue to wash me.
Continue to keep me. Continue to help me." And he does. Have you repented? Will you repent?
If you do, nobody who calls on the name of the Lord will be put to shame. He will forgive. He's paid the debt. Turn from your sin. Trust in Jesus and be free.
Let's pray. God, we thank you that there's victory and peace and rescue and hope and joy and salvation and life in Christ and Christ alone. Lord, may we turn from our sin. May we turn to you. May you pierce our hearts so that we might trust in Jesus.
And Lord, may you save to the full extent all those who cry out to you in Jesus name. Amen. Band's going to come back up. We're going to sing. If the Lord's dealing with you, don't fight him.
Don't press against that. But repent. If he's calling you to repentance, come accept the sacrifice. Accept the hope. Trust in Jesus.
Be made new. There's forgiveness and no other name under heaven. There's no other name given by one we might be saved. Would you trust in Jesus?
1 Samuel 6-7:2
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. Uh, grab a Bible, head to First Samuel, chapter 6. My name is Chad. If you don't, if I hadn't had the pleasure of getting to to know you yet, my name is Chad. I'm one of the pastors here.
Uh, we are working our way through 1 and 2 Samuel. We are in chapter 6. Our text today will be all of chapter 6 and just a little bit of chapter 7. We are studying this together. And so far, we have seen the birth of Samuel.
We have seen him begin to grow and develop uh around Eli the priest. We saw that his mother devoted him to the Lord. He was given over. He was uh then raised basically by Eli the high priest. We saw that Eli and his two sons Hoffni and Phineas were not good priests at all.
And uh we saw a man of God come and proclaim judgment on them. And then we saw that the Israelites went to battle against the Philistines. They lost. And then they said, "Well, let's take the ark of God into battle with us.
Then we'll definitely win." We saw them more definitively lose. The ark was taken. And the Philistines took the ark. And on that same day, Eli was killed. H Eli died.
Hafani and Phineas were killed. And um the ark left the people of Israel. The ark of the covenant was in um the land of the Philistines and God's hand was heavy upon them. And so last week we were looking at they basically tried to to bring the ark either inside of their worship or in somehow into Deegon's trophy room and it did not go well for them.
And so they just we just finished with them going, "Hey, let's get the ark out of here." And that's where we're going to pick up with today when they are trying to to get rid of the ark. So verse one of chapter 6, the ark of the Lord was in the country of the Philistines seven months. So for seven months, the ark is not where it should be. It is not with the people of God. And that's where we saw that they were distressed over the presence of the Lord leaving them, the glory of the Lord leaving them.
And the Philistines called for the priests and the divers and said, "What shall we do with the ark of the Lord? Tell us with what we shall send it to its place." So the first question is, "What should we do with it?" But then they have a clarifying comment. tell us how to get rid of it. If you if you give us any option that's keeping it, you're wrong. So they just say, "Hey, you priests and divers, y'all deal with this sort of stuff." God's currently, if we remember, he was afflicting them with tumors and then people were dying of terror.
They had just brought it around to Echron and Echron basically came out and said, "Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. Y'all aren't giving us that thing." And so they called all the the Philistine lords together and they say, "All right, what are we going to do?" They get the priests and the binders and they say, "How do we send this back?" They said, "If you send away the ark of the God of Israel, do not send it empty, but by all means, return him a guilt offering. Then you will be healed, and it will be known to you why his hand does not turn away from you." So they're saying, "Well, we'll send it back with a guilt offering with some sort of appeasement, and then if you're healed, we'll know that that's what this is what it was all about." And they said, "What is the guilt offering that we should return to him?" They answered, "Five golden tumors and five golden mice according to the number of the lords of the Philistines. For the same plague was was on all of you and on your lords. So you must make images of your tumors and images of your mice that ravage the land and give glory to the God of Israel." Okay, we'll talk about the tumors in a second.
First, the mice. So far, no mice have been mentioned at all. Best read is he says the mice at ravager land is that that was part of it. That there was some sort of also mice were there causing problems. But it it wasn't a big thing.
Maybe it was unrelated. Also, maybe they're the Philistines are weird and they're like, "Do you know what God's like? Mice. So, send some of those." It seems like they're trying to appease and they have this general understanding of of a God is a God of a thing.
So, if they've had problems with tumors and problems with mice, they're like, "Oh, wow. The Lord of Israel, he's like a tumors and mice God. So send him some tumors and mice. That's foreign to us because God is God of everything. And giving him well-crafted, beautiful tumors seems odd, but that's what they do.
And they're like, "We're going to send back. We're going to pay him back. We're going to try to appease him. And since he seems to like tumors and mice, we're going to send tumors and mice. That's the plan.
Okay. Perhaps he will lighten his hand from off of you and your gods and your land. So they they see this as the hand of God heavy upon them. Why should you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts?
After he had dealt severely with them, did they not send the people away and they departed? Okay. What God did to Israel is well known and this is hundreds of years to Egypt sorry what God did to Egypt is well known and this is hundreds of years later the Philistines have some understanding of this God and I love what they say they say don't harden your hearts didn't they end up sending them away anyway that's basically what they ask the Israelites won y'all remember that and the Israelites that's how the Israelites got to where they are now remember when the Israelites showed showed up over here because they were sent away from the Egyptians and they were like, they basically just said, "What if our plan is not make God pummel the snot out of us first? What if we just surrender real fast?" That's the plan. So they said, "We'll pay him back.
We'll surrender quickly and we'll see if this goes away." That's the plan. It's not a bad plan. So now, this is verse seven. Now then, I love I love the they're about to come up with the system by which they're going to do this, and it's going to prove to them whether or not God was doing this or not. And I love what they come up with.
They sound very clever. This is This is way better than the mice thing. I like this. This is good. All right.
Oh now, now then take and prepare a new cart and two milk cows on which there has never come a yoke and yoke the cows to the cart. But take their calves home away from them. And take the ark of the Lord and place it on the cart and put in a box at its side the figures of gold which you are returning to him as a guilt offering. Then send it off and let it go its way. and watch if it goes up on the way to its own land and they that is actually up in elevation.
They are more coastal where the Philistines are. So it would actually have to travel uphill towards uh Israel, the people of Israel. If it goes up on its way to his own land in to Beth Sheamesh, which is the road that would take him that way, then it is he who has done us this great harm. But if not, then we shall know that it is not his hand that struck us. It happened to us by coincidence.
make a gift, but then we're going to really figure out whether or not God's involved or not. And this plan has layers. All right. We want a new cart that's never gone anywhere. We want the cart to have no muscle memory.
We also want these cows to have never seen this cart go anywhere. New cart. And it's new. We're not sending an old cart, sending a new one. We want two milk cows who've never been yolked.
We don't want one milk cow because one milk cow can go by itself potentially somewhere. We want two so they have to work as a team. We also want them to be wholly unfamiliar with pulling something. We want you to take their calves and take them home. If a cow was going to wander off somewhere, it would most likely wander home or to where its calf is.
We want its calves and its home to be in the same place. Then we're going to watch and see if these two milk cows suddenly just form an elite team and head to a place they've never been to uphill away from their home and away from their calves. If that happens, we'll be pretty sure that God actually did this. I like that's a good plan. Otherwise, it's probably a coincidence.
You know, sometimes people just get tumors in mice and maybe that's what happened. All right. Verse 10. The men did so and took two milk cows and yolked them to the cart and shut up their calves at home. And they put the ark of the Lord on the cart and the box with the golden mice and the images of their tumors.
And the cows went straight in the direction of Beth Sheamesh along one highway lowing as they went. That means making loud cow noises. They took off and were like the whole way just I mean seemingly pulled or driven or just pumped up. But these two milk cows are like I was born for this. I know exactly where I'm going.
This cart has got to get to Beth Sheamesh quickly. They turned neither to the right nor to the left. And the lords of the Philistines went after them as far as the border of the of Beth Sheamesh. So the Philistine lords put this on as soon as it goes and the cows just start I mean mooing and taking off. And you know the the Philistine lords had to be like looking at each other like okay it's it's pretty clear.
It's probably going to work. And they follow him just kind of keeping an eye on like are they gonna and they go all the way to Beth Sheamesh. All right. Verse 13. Now the people of Beth Sheamesh were reaping their wheat harvest in the valley.
And when they lifted up their eyes and saw the ark, they rejoiced to see it. All right. You're you're reaping your wheat. It's regular work day. You hear some loud cows.
You look up. Two milk cows are just hauling the ark of the Lord into town. And they're pumped. They're like, "Hey, the ark's back. Look, the cows brought it." It doesn't say that, but I assume they noticed, you know.
And it says they rejoice. They rejoice to see. Okay, found my place. They rejoice to see it. That was verse 13.
Verse 14. The cart came into the field of Joshua of Beth Shemesh and stopped there. A great stone was there and they split up the wood of the cart and offered the cows as a burnt offering to the Lord. And the Levites took down the ark of the Lord and the box that was beside it, in which were the golden figures, and set them upon the great stone. So, so far they're doing okay.
They have Levites actually moved the ark, which there's only certain people who are allowed to move the ark. It has poles that you're supposed to move it by. All the tribes live in different areas, but the Levites are scattered all throughout the tribes. They move it. The men of Bashamesh offered burnt offerings and sacrifice sacrifices on that day to the Lord.
And when the five lords of the Philistines saw it, they returned that day to Echron. They cut up the cart. They sacrificed the cows. They have more sacrifices. They rejoice.
The Philistines ride back happy to be rid of this thing and certainly considering all that that took place. 17 These are the golden tumors that the Philistines returned as a guilt offering to the Lord. One for Ashdod, one for Gaza, one for Ashcolon, one for Gath, one for Echron, and the golden mice according to the number of all the cities of the Philistines belonging to the five lords, both fortified cities and unwalled villages, the great stone beside which they sat down the ark of the Lord, is a witness to this day in the field of Joshua of Beth Shemesh. Verse 19, and he struck some of the men of Beth Shemeshesh because they looked upon the ark of the Lord. He struck 70 men of them and the people mourned because the Lord had struck the people with a great blow.
So suddenly this story turns and what we're looking at today as we study this passage is the Philistines and the Israelites having to reckon with the holiness of God. that the Philistines and the Israelites are coming in contact with the holiness of God. And as we study this the rest of this morning, we are going to take up that consideration. We're going to as we look at this, we're going to reckon with the holiness of God as well. That the Israelites by being Israelites were not exempt from what it is like to interact with a holy God.
So it says, "And he struck some of the men of Bashamesh because they looked upon the ark of the Lord. He struck 70 men of them and the people mourned because the Lord had struck the people with a great blow." Now, there's a couple of things we need to say as we continue to move through this section. The first one is this. There is a textual I'm just kind of pausing the sermon for a second. There's a textual difficulty in verse 19.
1st Samuel chapter 6 verse 19. There's a textual difficulty in translating from the Hebrew manuscripts to the English. Our English translations all are going back and looking at the original languages and translating. and we have 17,000 copies of the Old Testament, some 6,000 copies or close to 6,000 of the New Testament. We have very reliable Bibles.
There are some places as we are translating from ancient languages and we have different manuscripts that are in different places where we can match everything up and we can look and we can know what what was in the original and what wasn't. There are a few places where there's still some difficulty. So, this is one of them. We took some time this week, Spencer and I sat down and actually just kind of dove into discussing a little bit of what's actually going on in this text in the translation process. And so if you're interested in that, it's 15 minutes.
That'll be on the website when we post the sermon. It'll be sermon audio group content. And underneath that'll be a video of us trying to talk through this section a little bit more for the person who's like, "Boy, textual variance is something I'm so interested in." We got you. We did not want to shorten that down and give no time to it this morning um and feel like we didn't handle it well. We also didn't want to suddenly make this sermon 57 minutes because we spent 15 on textual variance in the middle of it.
We also have linked a link to a Wesley Huff video if you're the type of person who just went, "Wait a second. I've never even considered the fact that this was translated into English and now I have all kinds of questions as how we go about that." Wesley Huff is very helpful in trying to explain some of that and he talks about the reliability of the Bible and the truthfulness of the Bible and we've we've linked that as well. So, back to the sermon, 70 men just died. I think when we're reading stuff like this, sometimes we might just go 70 men and we move on because we don't know these men. We don't live in this town.
But 70 men just died. And it's 70 men who would have been in the middle of this. 70 men who probably heads of households, firstborn sons in a town. We don't know exactly how big this is, but Besamesh does not loom large in the history of Israel. This is this they have this shining moment and there's a battle that's fought here later.
This would have been devastated. They they mourn and the nature by which they died would have stuck out in everybody's mind. This would have been if you think about like we the Challenger exploding or the Hindenburg the Hindenburg killed 36 people but we all know about it. We have certain things that loom large in our mind. But if you think about this area where there's the greater Columbia area has like 200,000 people.
If 70 people died, how much would we be talking about that? How much would we be considering that? How much would we be having marches and lighting candles and prayer vigils? If 70 people died from some sort of disease, the city would be shut down. This would be national news.
We'd all be figuring out whether or not we were going to get it. If they died in some sort of tragic accident, we'd all be aware of what happened and how it happened. 70 men die and they it it says they mourn. This is their struck. We don't know with what or how.
I don't know if that means that that the way they died is unimportant or that the way they died struck is a good explanation of it. How they die they died. How quickly? Why did they die?
What did they do? It says they looked upon the ark. Some English translations will say they looked in the ark. That's not really the word that's used, but they're trying to make an interpretive understanding of what did they do that was so wrong. If the ark could ride in, if the Philistines could be around it, if it could ride in on a carp, they had to have done something more.
I think the two explanations are either the ark was uncovered and there were 70 men who got together and excitedly were like let's see what's inside of this or the ark had been covered the entire time and they uncovered it which I actually think is quite likely. This is this is from Numbers chapter 4 says when the camp is set out Aaron and his son shall go in and take down the veil of the screen and cover the ark of the testimony with it. Then they shall put on it a covering of goat skin and spread on top of that a cloth of all blue and shall put it in its poles. That's how they always moved it when they were moving it in the tabernacle. Only the high priests were able to see it.
They covered it with three different coverings. Then they moved it with poles. It's likely to me that they covered it up the way they always cover it, the way it had always been taught to cover it. Now these priests weren't very good, so they were doing all kinds of stuff they weren't supposed to. So you can make the argument maybe they didn't.
But it seems likely that they would have had these things here. They would have covered it. They took it into the battle covered. It also seems likely to me that the Philistines who it told us in the other text wouldn't step on the threshold anymore after Deeon's head had been laid there. That was the head of their God.
It's an interesting story. God cut it off um if you did if you weren't here last week. But they no longer for they said still don't they still won't step on the threshold. the Philistines who have some understanding of the holiness of God, some understanding of the fearfulness of the God who went and and got the Israelites out of Egypt, that they would have just left it covered. They got it, but this is how it came and they would have not uncovered it.
And so, it's quite possible that it rode covered and that they said, "Let's look at this." Either way, they either uncovered it or opened it. And what they did was they approached a holy God as if he were commonplace. They took something that was holy and they profamedained it as if they were just allowed access and could approach it however they wanted to. They ran into the holiness of God. They had to reckon with the holiness of God.
And it says this in verse 20. Then the men of Beth Sheamesh said, "Who is able to stand before the Lord, this holy God, and to whom shall he go up away from us?" So they said, "Who who can stand before this holy God? And to who should we send him to?" First answer is probably like, "We don't none of us. And who who do we want to just He's got to get away from us." So they sent messengers to the inhabitants of Kiraath Jereim, saying, "The Philistines have returned the ark of the Lord. Come down and take it up to you." I don't know if they gave them more information.
The information that we're told they gave them, y'all, 70 men just died and they're like, "Hey, Kiratim, guess what? You get an ark. Come get it." because they're afraid of it. Chapter 7. And the men of Kiraathjarim came and took up the ark of the Lord and brought it to the house of Abenadab on the hill.
And they consecrated his son Eleazar to have charge of the ark of the Lord. From that day from the day that the ark was oh goodness from the day that the ark was lodged at Kiraim, a long time passed, some 20 years, and all the house of Israel lamented after the Lord. So cur seems to handle it. Okay.
They consecrate someone for him. They say this is your whole job just caring for this. They put it in a place. Now it's interesting. They did not take it back to Shiloh.
We don't know what happened to Shiloh. We know that later Jeremiah in prophesying against the people of Israel says God's going to make this city like Shiloh, destroyed and without inhabitant. So it seems as if when 30,000 men of Israel were killed in the battle that they lost the ark, Shiloh was somehow also overtaken, destroyed. But we also know the three high priests died. But the there's just really no mention of Shiloh does not come back up as a thing.
They don't take it back to Shiloh. They take it to some guy's house. They close it up and 20 years passes and it says everybody was just kind of sad lamenting after the Lord. But there's a question that the people of Bashamesh ask and I think we should consider it with them this morning because I think the text forces us to consider this idea. They say who is able to stand before the Lord this holy God.
I think the Philistines were running into this. The people of Israel were running into this. And they asked this question and I think we ought to consider it with them. Who is able to stand before the Lord, this holy God?
We are not culturally well set up when it comes to considering holiness. We just aren't. We don't think of much as sacred. We don't think of much as holy. We're we're a pretty um flat society as far as everybody's fair game.
Hey, we were just joking. Don't you have a sense of humor? Like we we just in general we we aren't a respectful group of people. We started off by fighting off a king and ever since then we just are like, "Uh, if you want us to show you a lot of respect, you're probably super annoying." We just aren't well designed for it. So when we consider things like the holiness of God, we aren't well set up culturally for that.
There are other cultures who understand this a little bit better than we do. I think we're tempted sometimes to read passages like this and go, you know, you'll even hear people say sometimes, well, yeah, well that was the Old Testament. The character, the nature of God has not changed. But we want to almost say sometimes, well, I'm glad he's not like that anymore. He is he is still like this.
He is still unapproachably holy. Then if we think more about it, if we have to actually sit and consider it, there are times where we go, I I don't know why he would do that. I don't know why he would act like that. I don't know why he would respond like that. If I was hanging out at my house near my fire pit, if I dropped something in the fire and just reached into it and pulled pulled it out and then later was sitting with a doctor as he was tending to my hand and I said, "I don't know why the fire acted like that.
I don't know why it responded that way. It would display that I had a grievous misunderstanding of the nature of fire. And when we say, "I don't know why God did that," it displays, it betrays, it tells on us that we have a grievous misunderstanding about the holiness of God. And we do, we call him the man upstairs. We say, "God's my co-pilot." We have hilarious jokes about him golfing.
We don't care. We've never broken out in a sweat over those things. We've never considered that we are presuming to elevate ourselves or to lower him and that either one of those is vast wickedness. First thing we need to understand is that God is holy. We need to know what that word means when it says this holy God.
What does that mean to be holy? There's really two ways the Bible uses that word. And basically, whenever it uses the word, it carries both definitions, maybe emphasizing one or the other at the time, but both are carried with the word holy. The one that we consider more often is actually the one the Bible considers less often. The one we think about the most is the idea of moral purity.
That he's good, that he's righteous, or that he'll say things to us like, "Be holy as I am holy." Meaning, pursue moral purity. And the Bible does mean that when it says it, but the word in the Hebrew comes from the Hebrew word cut. It primarily means separate and distinct. That God is unlike anything else. When the angels sing holy, holy, holy, they're saying distinct, other other something else.
all together that we are not like God. We are not on the same level or the same plane. We do not exist in the same category. That he is vast and majestic and good and pure and righteous and beyond reckoning and beyond understanding outside of the the understanding that he graciously gives. He is glorious in an unfathomable way.
That he is other, foreign, not common, not approachable, not pocketable, not tameable, not simple, not small, holy. This is Hannah's prayer in 1st Samuel chapter 2. We read this. She says, "There is none holy like the Lord, for there is none besides you. There is no rock like our God." Your holiness is a holiness that is only you have this holiness because there's no one like you.
There is nothing similar. RC Sproul would ask his students sometimes, "What's more like God? A worm or saraphim?" Which is a a type of angel? And then he would say neither because God is altogether holy and unlike other things. This is why the Proverbs 9:10 says the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.
That that's where we need to begin with trying to understand his holiness and we need to begin with fear and reverence. We often have this common notion that we have the ability to evaluate him, to understand him. A lot of us are like, "Yeah, I already know about God." As if he's simple. Y'all, my sons this past week said, "What's the difference between gasoline and diesel?
And I said they are different substances. If you want to know the science behind it, I have no clue. I know that if you fill your car up with diesel, it won't work. And vice versa, because it's it's a different it's a different type. If they' have said what, I'd have been like, "Gas liquid.
A liquid gas. Stop asking questions. There are certain things that I understand are beyond me. Maybe I could go learn it, but there are certain things like I don't know what it was for you. I don't know if it was calculus where you were just like, I'm done.
I let me go see where's the registar. I'm going to drop this. Do I need it to graduate? Will a D minus work?
There are certain things that we just gave up on and you just know I don't understand that. Someone's like, I'll explain it to you. You're like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm never going to understand that. Stop talking to me.
And we have the audacity at times to be like, "Yeah, but I got God. Him. I've I've got I I got that. I understand how that works. The Bible speaks of him as other, as holy, as separate, as vast.
His ways are not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts. We are not able to grasp him. He reveals himself to us, but he is not simple, small, or pocketable. We need to know that he's holy.
We also need to know that we're sinful. They ask the question, who is able to stand? They look around and they go, "Can any of y'all? Who who who can who can go before him?
He's holy. Who can go before him? You need to know you're sinful. That he is holy beyond measure, beyond comprehension, and that we are sinful." Yeah. It's so crazy to me sometimes the way we'll view ourselves in relation to God where we'll say things like, "Well, I'm not that bad.
I'm okay." It's like, you aren't even the nicest person at your job. You went to a school of 400 people and you were like in the middle. We're not talking historically or globally. The way we do it most of the time is we just look downhill and go, "That guy's way worse than me." And then we'll just somehow presume to relate to God. I remember when I was at the hospital, my wife had just had a baby.
They were going to hand me my baby and they were like, "Wash your hands." And I remember thinking, "Good call. Right. Oh, yeah. Do Do you wear sunglasses and sunscreen?
Do you think that there should be a barrier between you and a ball of fire that's really really far away? And do you think that you can approach God who dwells in unapproachable light in the glare of his holiness and be fine? Our audacity and pride and presumption is baffling. He is holy and we are sinful and he sees through us. Before him we are not dressed up.
He is not mistaken. He sees to the core of our hearts and our beings. You don't even see yourself as well as he sees you. We need to know that he's holy. And when they ask the question, who can stand before him?
We need to know that answer includes not you and not me. And if we're tempted to say, "Yeah, but but it's different now." It is and it isn't. I want to show you Hebrews 12. Hebrews 12, New Testament written to the Church, written to Christians. It says this.
This is verse 18. For you have not come to what may be touched. What we have approached in God is not something that is approachable. You've not come to something that may be touched. If you were somewhere in a radioactive area, everybody's wearing hazmat suits or whatever, and you're like, "What?
That's radioactive?" And you just grabbed it and stuck it in your pocket, and then it burned through your hand and your pants, and they'd be like, "Yeah, fool. That's not how this works." And he's saying, "You haven't come to something that is that simple. That that is easy. It says you have not come to something that may be touched." And then he's going to use Old Testament imagery, pictures, things that happen to describe what we have been welcomed into, brought into. a blazing fire and darkness and gloom and a tempest.
So, a pitch black firestorm and the sound of a trumpet and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that no further messages be spoken to them. All the people of Israel have been rescued out of Egypt. God speaks and they say, "Moses, please, please, please tell him not to talk to us anymore. Let him talk to you. We'll listen to you.
let him talk to you, but don't have him talk to us. And then we say things like, "Well, if there is a God, I've got some questions for him." No, you don't. That is not how that will work. For they could not endure, this is verse 20, the order that was given, "If even a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned." Indeed, so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, "I tremble with fear. How many of you were like, I'm I'm pretty good.
Like it's me and then Moses is here. Moses in interacting with God who had seen all that he had done and had related to him in all these ways is like he trembles with fear. But you have come to Mount Zion, and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, if you think it's wise to wear a suit and speak respectfully when you go to court, but that you think that you can just strut in front of the God, the judge of all, like we our our thinking is broken here and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect and to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel and you're reading this and you're going what is it even talking about exactly some of that you're like okay I know that okay but it's saying you have approached something that is so vast so glorious so good so holy it's not something that can be touched. The entrance is not simple. And it says to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant.
You can't approach God, but Jesus can. And Jesus mediates so that the work of Christ purchases for us access to all of this. It is not something we access on our own. It is not something that we come in on our own. It is not something that you do on your own.
It is something that Christ has done through the work on the cross. That he is God who became man so that he could pay our debt. He was standing on our side. But he's also God so that he can be holy and righteous and actually pay a debt that applies to everyone. That his blood is so precious that it covers all of our sin.
And so that he is able to mediate a covenant between us, sinful us, and a holy God beyond reckoning. If we lose the holiness of God, we will lose the love of Christ. We will lose the humility of Christ. We will miss out on understanding mercy and forgiveness. Tim Keller relates a story.
He's a pastor in New York. He relates a story. He says he's talking to a lady and she says, "I I believe in God. I just can't the idea that Jesus had to die." And he said, "Okay, let me ask you a question.
Does God forgive you?" And she said, "Yeah." He said, "Okay, what does it cost him? What does it cost him to forgive you? and she's like, "Well, it I guess nothing. It's just not that big a deal." And what he said is, "It's it's like a pendulum. If the pendulum only goes here on holiness, he actually doesn't care that much.
It's actually not that big a deal. He actually doesn't love that much because our sins that we commit against each other aren't that bad to him. He doesn't care how we treat each other. He doesn't mind all the wickedness in the world and he's not that holy. So sins against him don't matter that much.
If the pendulum only goes to here, then his love and mercy and grace can only go to here. But he says, "No, if you understand his holiness and you understand your wickedness and you understand your depravity and you understand that you cannot approach him or you will be undone, then oh how glorious is Christ. Oh, how loving is the father. Oh, how merciful he is. It's only in the light of his holiness and the depths of our sin do we know how glorious and good Jesus is.
Our are our affection so stirred for him. If you are not in love with Christ, if you do not see him as glorious and beautiful and wonderful, it's quite possible that you don't see yourself as very sinful or you don't see God as very holy. And one of the things that I think continues to happen and I'm concerned for our Church at times is that we talk a lot about the love of Christ, but we fail to see our sin and we fail to see God's holiness. But mercy is beautiful in the light of my wickedness. And forgiveness is real when I know the depth of depravity I was drowning under.
And when I understand that I would be shredded in the light of God's holiness. Oh, how glorious is Christ. And that's what the New Testament says over and over again. Colossians 1, I'm gonna read one passage. And you who were once alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, we were over here.
We were wicked, depraved, and unprotected from the holiness of God. He has now, that's Christ, reconciled in his body of flesh by his death in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach. That he's invited us into holiness through his death, through his blood, through his sacrifice, through his rescue. And our hope is in Christ. And if we don't have Christ, we don't have hope.
So what do we do with a text like this? How do we apply this? First, I would say to the Church, I want you to consider who you are without Christ. I want you to begin to expand your understanding of the holiness of God and what that means. And I want you to rejoice at your hearts stirred for how good and glorious and kind Jesus is.
That he would die to save sinners. That we would have hope in him. I want you to sing. I want you to sing thinking about Jesus and God's holiness and your sin and not about what you're going to have for lunch. And who can hear you singing?
I want you to pray as someone who knows that that right was purchased with precious blood beyond measure. I want you to follow Christ as someone who delights in understanding that you've been made holy and blameless by the mercy of Jesus. I want us to take very seriously and consider what we joke about and what we're willing to put up with when it comes to how God is treated. And if you're not a Christian, that means you are without Christ. And I want you to understand very clearly that you are covered in your sin and your wickedness and there is no one mediating between you and a holy God.
You are as guilty as they come and there is the glare of a righteous light and a glorious God to be reckoned with. And you will not stand. Jesus says, "Nobody comes to the father except through me." There's no one who makes it the father except through Christ. And that there is an offer of a mediator who will pay your debt, who paid the costly penalty to rescue you, who has love unimaginable and mercy that covers all of our sin if we will but come to him and say, "I need your rescue." And I would encourage you to do that. Let's pray.
Lord God, you are holy. You are distinct. You are separate. You are high and above all that we can think or imagine. And so Lord, we praise you and we praise the glorious name of Christ who humbled himself, taking on the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men and dying a death on a cross so that we might be rescued.
And Lord, I pray for the person in this room who is not in Christ that they would see a terrible glimpse of your holiness. that they would see the depth of their sin. And Lord, that they would run to Jesus whose blood can wash away all of our sin and make us white and clean and saved with hope. May we honor you, Lord. May your name be honored as holy among your people in Jesus name.
Amen. The band's going to come back up and we're going to sing together. And I would invite you as they get set up and as we're getting on the stage ready to lead us in worship that you would consider the holiness of God. That you would consider yourself for a moment and then respond accordingly.
Additional Resources
1 Samuel 5
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Morning my name is Spencer I'm one of the pastors here we are continue to walk through 1 Samuel we are in chapter 5 today so you can go ahead and turn there we're going to go through all of chapter 5 so I enjoy history like I like it a lot like if I'm on Netflix and I see a World War II documentary it's dangerous cuz that's 10 hours of my life that just will get captured so easy uh the more I study history I I appreciate some of the things that I learned uh one of the things that uh is consistent that I've seen uh is that humans really aren't that much different over time.
I mean times change but people in our nature we just kind of stay the same that people from centuries ago they certainly you know don't have some of the technological advances that we have and some of the resources that we have but we're actually not that much smarter than they are which I know may feel that feels like we got all kinds of things that we have that they didn't have back then but generally I just don't think we're that much uh smarter and certainly not that much wiser I mean they could like years ago could navigate uh at Night by The Stars like they just looked at the stars and just chared a path.
And I got night I have a GPS and like I maybe can follow it sometimes the map gets flipped around but I'm really dependent upon that to get around ancient Hebrew children they memorize the first five books of the Old Testament memorize them just pick a Bible up and see how long that is and like we barely can memorize lines from movies like we we just I mean the Egyptians built uh the pyramids and they still stand thousands of years later and we built skyscrapers that I don't know might last a century who knows even like.
If you read stuff that was written a few hundred years ago like I have this quote from Jonathan Edwards that he wrote uh hundreds of years ago and I just want to read this is a from excerpt from his letter just listen to the language here he says forgive me that I do not conceal my name and communicate this to you through a mediator I do not state it as a hypothesis but as a plain fact which my own eyes have witnessed in which everyone senses may make him as certain of as of anything else although these things appear to me thus certain still I submit the whole to your better judgment and deeper insight.
And I humbly beg to be pardoned for running the Venture though an utter stranger of troubling you with so prolix an account of that which I am altogether uncertain whether you will esteem worthy the time and the Pains of reading he was 11 that is a letter he wrote when he was 11 years old and I think it's important to realize this because what happens is is that when we look back at history we think oh they were so unenlightened primitive.
Because we have like chat GPT that can write an email for us or we can access mostly correct information from Wikipedia that makes us so much more enlightened than they are I think that's it's it's helpful to be humbled by history and looking at this because when you get to passages like we have today you can read them and have a position of arrogance that says oh they were so primitive so foolish so unenlightened and you will miss the reality that we are not that much different than them that some of the things we.
See in this passage are some of the same things that we do in just different ways today and my hope is as we walk through this we'll still see that human nature is still quite Fallen that we still run to things and choose bad Pursuits in the place of running to God and that we are still desperately in need of the Savior so I will pray and then we'll walk through this passage together heavenly father I pray that you would humble our hearts to receive your word that we might.
See you so clearly as the only one worthy of our worship and our our Pursuit and that that would change the way we live we ask this in Jesus name amen all right so we'll pick up in verse one it says when the Philistines captured the Ark of God they brought it from Ebenezer to ashdod then the Philistines took the Ark of God and brought it into the house of deeon and set it up beside deeon which disclaimer some versions will say Deon that's how it's pronounced other ones other people will say Dagon I'm going to try to stick with Deon.
But Dagon sounds really Southern and it might come out either one's okay just don't be annoyed if I switch between the two but partly of what's Happening Here I would argue is that as we saw last week the Israelites were defeated okay the Philistines take the Ark of the Covenant they bring it back to their land and they set it up beside deeon which is a little bit of we beat you we defeated you and and you should should be humiliated this is what armies did.
For centuries this is what they've always done the the Romans they uh they used to have something called the Roman Triumph at procession and what that was is when they defeated and conquered a mighty enemy they would parade them into Rome and they had the Victorious General up front and then you'd have all the spoils of Victory behind and then these Mighty Warriors that they defeated were now humbled and chains and shackles dragged in front of everyone as they're feasting and rly and celebrating.
And then they would behead them and sell them off as slaves as a big feast and celebration this is what ancient armies this is what they they did and and something even when you go further back to the time where this is written in their context one of the things they would do is that when you conquered a people to really show your utter uh uh control in winning the battle that you won you would take their God and you make it a part of yours you'd bring it in and partly this is to bring shame upon the people we are.
So powerful our army is so mighty and our gods are so much greater we beat you and now we take yours and that's what's happening they bring the Ark of the Covenant and they bring it into one of the five major cities of philistia the land of the Philistines there are five major cities ashdod gath ashalon erron and uh Gaza which that is the same region Gaza that's still today not the same people but the same region so one of these five major cities ashad they bring uh uh the ark of the Covenant into ashad and they set it into the house of deeon.
Now this is a a false G uh that didn't originate with them it actually originated in ancient Syria but they've adopted it as one of their own now we don't know for sure what this false God was supposed to provide for the people because that's how a lot of these Idols worked is they they were over something so uh when I read uh the story book Gospel story book Bible we do Family Worship at night sometimes we have the Gospel story book Bible and I'll read this.
When we get to the story uh they picture it as a a kind of a fish human uh uh type God and that draws on a tradition that looks at this and says oh this is a God that would have overseen uh uh fishing or or Maritime Journeys others will say no no no no no this was uh this was more of a of a God who ever saw grain uh in in Grain harvesting I don't know I don't think we know.
For sure but this is what they would do Deon was a God that you would go to in order to get something and I think that's something that we need to understand in order to understand how idolatry worked at that time because I think we ever simplify this and think oh they think that that that statue that stone statue of deeon is is literally that's the God and we think oh how foolish and silly that they would go down and and bow down to these Idols.
When I was in India years ago I went around and I saw some of these temples that they would literally bow down to some of these idols and pay hge to and do these practices and it's not that simple because it's more of a doorway to this Deon God who is in the air somewhere and and and he provides could be fish for these coastal cities and that you go to get that from that God just like you would go to we hear about in the Old Testament ba or Baal that you would go to Baal.
Because he would help you get Harvest a good harvest which is how you both uh survived on food and also how you provided for your family by making trade with a good harvest or or or go to B go to Bale for uh fertility so you can have children so really these Idols are set up to take you to a God who provide you what you want in your heart what you desire you go to this God and this God will provide it.
For you that is how idol worship works so they bring the Ark of the Covenant in before deeon which again I think is a little bit of a flex to show we have won and in their arrogance and in their idol worship we're going to see this does not go unpunished verse three when the people of ashdod Rose early the next day behold deeon had fallen faced downward on the ground before the Ark of the Lord we'll stop there I like to imagine that they probably are celebrating the night before they just beat the Israelites they bed them they took the ark they probably celebrated lots of drinking they wake up the next morning wiping.
The sleep from their eyes and then they they go let's go look at let's go look at the Ark of the Covenant let's go see it before our God and when they get there what they see is that deeon has fallen on his face face now note the imagery here fallen on his face before the Ark of the Covenant this false God is in submission to the one true God this is the beginning of their punishment this is the beginning of their judgment and this is what they're going to.
See even more of they needed to be reminded out the gate and what they're going to continue to be reminded of is that they aren't the ones that actually won the victory that that's what we saw last week God gives the victory to them he defeats his own people this is an act of judgment against the Israelites so they didn't win the Victory and they're starting to get arrogant and prideful about this victory that they were given and they need to be held in check.
When I play with my kids sometimes I do let them win every now and then I let them lose a lot because I'm not the kind of dad that's just like oh yeah buddy you're going to win like come on you go it's like that no kids need to learn to lose it builds character but if you do it too much it destroys their spirit so there's got to be some times where they win but sometimes if they win they get a little bigheaded and that's.
When I destroy them just decimate them so they know who's the boss they know and the Philistines have not learned that yet they about to learn that pick up in verse end of verse three it says so they took Deon put him back in his place which again the imagery there imagine a God so powerful he needs his Idol lifted back into place verse four but when they Rose early on the next morning behold deeon had fallen face downward on the ground before the Ark of the.
Lord and the head of Deon and both his hands were lying cut off on the threshold only the trunk of Deon was left to him so I imagine they wake up the next morning little less cocky little more hesitant go towards the house of deeon and what they see is frightening deon's head decapitated off on the threshold hands cut off on the threshold and it's like oh we we have a problem only his trunk remains which just for clarity when I read trunk my mind just goes to elephant trunk not that this is body trunk.
Okay other versions make sure that you know this is the Torso so just he's a torso no head no hands falling on the threshold this is uh a u when ancients used to win battles what they would do is they would literally they would they would cut off heads as a head count literal head count and cut off hands to so this is this is how many people we killed in battle and this is a picture of that I've just destroyed your or false.
God and his head is on the threshold and this left such an impression on the Philistines when it says verse 5 says this is why the priest of deeon and all who enter the house of deeon do not tread on the threshold of deeon in ashdod to this day so as they recounting the story it's like this is why they're so superstitious they skip over the threshold they remember what the God of the Israelites did to deeon beheaded them cut his hands off and it still fearfully rules the people to that Day verse six we.
See that now God is taking the fight to the people the hand of the Lord was Heavy against the people of ashdod and he was terrified and Afflicted them with tumors both ashdod and its territory okay so now they're starting to wake up and starting to see every day that they're developing tumors and after the dismantling of deeon and after they get these tumors that fear is starting to set in even more so because listen a tumor is is unnerving it doesn't matter what century you live in that's not something you want to.
See and I think I think we're a little unfamiliar with this because I think in our culture we catch tumors more quickly before they actually develop into physical you can see them we have good medicine uh I was in Dominican Republic years ago in a mission trip and I saw a woman who was very poor and she was begging for money and she had a grapefruit sized tumor on her neck and it's like that happens where you don't have good medicine the tumors keep growing and they can be painful they're certainly frightening have all types of complications that are happening and the people are afraid and also again they're not they're not stupid.
Because sometimes we have this historical arrogance because if it was just one person you think isolated event when it's all the people they know there's a common cause and they know who the common cause is they know it is the Lord so we pick up verse 7 it says when the men of ashdod saw how things were they said the Ark of the God of Israel must not remain with us for his hand is hard against us and against deeon our.
God they know who was doing this they know who chopped up Deon they know who is in afflicting them with tumors they have messed up this is like the the schoolyard bully that picks on the kid that's been taking like six years of Jiu-Jitsu he's just been gearing up for this day it is not going well for the Philistines they have messed up and it's going to continue to go poorly for them so verse eight they so they sent and gathered together all the Lords of the Philistines and said what shall we do with the Ark of the.
God of Israel so they get all the leaders together the Lords of the Philistines these five cities and they're like what what should we do they answered let the Ark of the God of Israel be brought around to gath so they brought the Ark of the God of Israel there so again ashdod gath Gaza ashalon ekron these five major cities in philistia and they decide this is going to gath now I don't know if it's because Gaff drew the short stick or they just were the weaker one and it's like you're taking them I don't know.
If they in their arrogance were like we'll take him on I don't know how they made this decision but they made a poor one and it is now going to gath and this is not going to go well verse 9 but after they had brought it around the hand of the Lord was against the city causing a very great panic and he Afflicted the men of the city both young and old so that tumors broke out on them so the same thing happens in gath they're Afflicted there're being tumors breaking out over everyone and they're like this the ark cannot stay here.
Verse 10 so they sent the Ark of God to ekran one of the other cities but as soon as the Ark of God came to ekran the people of ekran cried out they have brought around to us the Ark of God of Israel to kill us and our people people so like they catch wind of the Ark showing up and outside the city they're like no you are not bringing the ark into this city we are going to die and at this point they have to get get the team back together get the Lords of the Philistines back together to make a decision.
Verse 11 they sent therefore and gathered together all the Lords of the Philistines and said send away the Ark of the God of isra Israel and let it return to its own place that it may not kill us and our people for there was a deadly Panic throughout the whole city the hand of God was Heavy there which again that's another another little wrinkle we get to see it wasn't just tumors and death there's a panic so great it's deadly I don't know.
If that's like yelling fire in a crowded theater or if they were just struck dead and fear but the Panic is also judgment that's how afraid they are of the Lord and then it says the men who did not die were struck with tumors and the city and the Cry of the city went up to heaven so they make the decision the ark has to has to go back we have messed up they thought they could capture the ark tame carry make it theirs is not going to happen and we're going to learn next week how they send the ark back once they are making really making up.
For their massive mistake all right so that's chapter 5 that's the story and there's something that's abundantly clear when you read this story and that is that God is greater than idols and Idols fail it's so clear God is greater than idols and Idols fail and what happens for us sometimes again I think we're in danger of of reading this story and then saying how primitive and stupid for them to not only just bow down and pay homage to a stone statue.
But to think they could do that to the Lord I mean what a foolish and silly people and in doing that we will distance ourselves from the story in a way that we think we're wiser and somehow better but the reality is is that we are not we are not wiser we are not better we do some of the same practices we are just more sophisticated and modernized in how we do this and for the rest of our time I want us to.
See that clearly I want us to see that we have our own ways of worshiping Idols in the place of God and that we need to see that God actually is greater than the idols that we worship and that those Idols in pursuing them will only fail us so in order to understand this you need to understand what idol worship is for us Idols are created things and it is worshiping these created things in the place of the Creator okay and worship is devotion it is giving your your time and your energy and your talents and your money and your heart towards something and idol worship is towards created things in the place of the.
Creator and by the time you get to uh the prophet Ezekiel in chapter 14 we start to see when you read Ezekiel 14 he talks about taking Idols into your heart and what we see is is that Idols is taking creative things into your heart to Worship in the place of God the Theologian John Calvin uh in commenting on this talks about our hearts as Idol making factories that we will chase after created things to satisfy us to fulfill us to bring us joy to bring us provision in the place of.
God and when you think about that as a construct of how that place out in our lives what you will start to see is that we do this with creative things all the time that we run to created things with a type of devotion that is worship that is only supposed to be given to the one true God we do this with lots of things we do this with money I mean how many people this week watch the stock market crash read fears of recession and checked their portfolios over and over and over again check checking bank accounts thinking about how to always how to make money and getting angry and anxious and depressed.
When you don't have enough of it and when you start to evaluate your soul and yours your approach to money you start to realize there's a type of devotion and commitment to this that is elevated to the place of Creator where that's getting some of your best energy in life and it reveals that you worship money you've made an idol out of a created thing this happens with riches the so much of life becomes about accumulating things what's the point of living.
If you can't have creature comfort if you can't have the newest this the newest that there there's a old sermon illustration that you don't see a U-Haul behind hearse right because you can't take it with you that's been used for like decades I'm sure that goes back to baptist churches in the 40s maybe not the U-Haul part but waging something okay and the idea there is that you can't take it with you but what I've heard in the past few years is a popularized version of that that teaches.
Well you don't see you whole B Earth so I mean you better enjoy it now you can't take it with you you got to got to spend it while you got it and I'm it's like oh man we've like we've taken like Parables that we've used in sermons and made them that have elevated riches to the place of God we do this with all types of things do it with sex that sex becomes something that you think about that you obsess about that you day dream about that you mine and search online over and over and over again that.
So much about life isn't worth living if you can't fulfill your sexual desires that's been elevated to a place in our culture and in our hearts and it's getting devotion it's getting affection it's getting energy that's only been meant and was designed to be given to the Lord we do this with success that so much of our energy and best energy in life is about being successful and that might for a lot of people that's that's in the workplace so much.
So that like you put all of your best energy into how you work and how you do your job that when you get home you might have responsibilities but you just check out because you've done your job but so much of your best energy is is trying to achieve success and if you don't get it you're angry you're depressed you're sad you're bitter maybe even angry at the Lord God why haven't you given me fill in the blank contentment is always Out Of Reach this is what we do this is what Humanity has always done we will take created things which by the way some of them are neutral there's nothing wrong with money in.
Itself there's nothing wrong with success success in itself and we elevate it to the place of God and we pursue it and we worship it and we need to so clearly see that God does not share the throne with created things Our God does not share that space with creation he demands to be worshiped alone and here's the beauty of it when we realize that that God Alone is is worthy of that type of worship and that typee of devotion when we realize that.
And then we start to chase after God that is where you actually experience fulfillment and joy and satisfaction and so many of the things that the idols in our life seem that they might provide but you keep running after that's why this house is not enough we need this house that's why this vehicle is not enough we need this that's why this type of family is not enough we need this that's why this sex life is not enough we need this.
But we once we realize that actually what God is worthy of my worship and I could be most satisfied in him that's when You' realized where true goodness is actually found and Pascal's uh illustration on this from centuries ago about the God-shaped hole in our hearts that you try to fill in with created things still stands today there things that you try to fill in your life that only a this God-sized hole that only the the Lord is meant to fulfill.
But once you realize that and you experience the Lord and are satisfied in him it's wonderful It's a Wonderful reality to live in and if you've been convinced of this this is good and then you can start the path of repentance towards not worshiping idols and worshiping the one true God but just take the example of success that I just talked about that if you come to the realization yeah no every promotion every business I've started every every every that I've gotten is never actually fulfilled.
But I want to worship God I want to be Delight I want to Delight in the Lord that yes that never that never fills me up it only fails me I want God I'm going to do it like 2025 is the year that'll make the shift and I'm going to schedule a few more vacations I'm going to put my phone on do not disturb like I'm doing it I'm doing the things and listen those are good things and those certainly can be a part of uh the equation.
But what you will realize is is that if you just start making shifts like that I'm going to change this right here and change this behavior and do this right here and take this out and insert this that when you do that what you might realize is is that you will automatically default back into patterns of being a alcoholic and and and chasing after success and you'll wonder but I tried and I and I'm not changing why do I keep pursuing success with worship like why do I Elevate this over and over again and what I want to push on is that we need to really.
See the reason behind the reason we need to see the why behind the why here because all those things those shifts you can make in your life and if you worship sex and pornography is a part of that and you can put filters on your phone you can get a dumb phone you can not you can drop your Netflix account you can do all the things but if you don't get at the reasons behind why you operate and why you chase after created things it's going to be difficult it's going to be trying to treat a tumor a brain tumor with a Tylenol you're just treating symptoms and you got to get to the core.
Of the issue and one of the one of the the things that we have taught and continue to teach that we find to be incredibly helpful in understanding ourselves and our pursuit of Idols is a concept called Deep Idols it it's it's called Deep Idols now you can't chap inv verse this you ain't going to find that in third Corinthians like this is this is a helpful approach approach we got from uh from Tim Keller he got it from gotam Dave powellson.
But this is a helpful approach to uh idolatry that gets at the reason behind the reason the idol beneath the idol and how he summarizes this is that there's four deep idols and again you could come up with any system I think to help understand why we pursue the things we pursue but we stuck with this one and we've seen it be incredibly fruitful in the lives of our Church family as we walk through this but he reduces down these deeper level desires to four deep idols and they are Comfort approval power and control Comfort approval power and control these four deep Idols are the reason behind the reason these are the Deep desires that.
We should ultimately find in the Lord we should find our approval in the Lord our comfort in the Lord but it is the reason why so many of us chase after these creat things so take success as the example that we're using right now if you want to understand why you're chasing after success and why that's your default node this is a helpful framework to be able to understand that so if you do the soul workor of investigating and asking these questions and prayerfully coming before the.
Lord and and and and asking the Lord to reveal this and he reveals that really it's Comfort idolatry this deep deep Idol of comfort is the reason it's the root behind what is growing beneath above ground and bearing this bad fruit in your life that when you come to that realization with success you might confess I am a workaholic so that I can play hard I work hard so I can play hard and that's on the weekends but that's also I work.
So hard now so that I can be comfortable both now and also in retirement I'm trying to retire early so I can have 30 years to have a catamaran in the Gulf of a me America Mexico that's what I that's my life and if I can just have that type of comfort I will put success above everything because that is the good life and my hope is we' be confronted in the Gospel and realizing that you'll never be satisfied and I also would hope to be confronted.
If even if that's your goal even as pertains to retirement that you would reframe your understanding of retirement where do you see retirement in the Bible that you can go to the gulf or the mountains and live it up for 20 30 years I some of our folks folks that are ending retirement the things I'm pushing on right now is to say what would it look like for you to use the next 10 15 20 25 years to the glory of Christ and sure you're going to slow down and you should and sure you might not work that cre anymore you you your body's not going to be able to.
But how wonderful would it be as you slow down to still give your time and your energy towards devoting yourself to the Lord anyways I'll introduce you to a guy named John Piper he'll you'll love him he will wreck your retirement plans anyways Comfort let me get back let me get back on track approval all right so if you come to the conclusion that you have approval idolatry in your heart that's a deep level desire for you you may confess I'm a workaholic.
Because I'm so afraid to let anyone down they'll think less of me they won't respect me I got to please my boss I got to make sure my co-workers approve of me and ultimately the reason behind this is to be liked to be approved of you see how that's different than Comfort once you start to understand the reasons in your own heart that maybe the reason that you slave so hard for success is because you don't find your approval in the.
Lord but in people this happens with power idolatry maybe you come to the conclusion that I have this deep Idol of power and you might confess I'm a workaholic so I can get to the top cuz I'm so sick and tired of answering to superiors who are idiots and I'm so sick and tired of bosses who don't know how to run a company I'm going to build my own company I'm going to start my own business I'm going to make CEO and no one's going to tell me how to do my job anymore.
Because I know best and you have this realization your heart that says oh no the reason I work so hard and give that my best energy is because that's what I really want as opposed to seeing God as the seed of power and the king and we work unto him and that's who we're truly in submission to and submission to anyone is actually a practice ultimately of submitting to the Lord you might realize that control deep idolatry Reigns in your heart and you may come to this confession that says.
God I'm a workaholic because I think no one can do my job like me I've got to have my hands in the steering wheel and if I don't everything falls apart they need me there and I and I got to be the one that holds it all together if I don't hold it all together it's just everything's going to fall apart that no one can do it quite like me and when you start to understand these deeper reasons for why we chase after these created things you can start to begin to speak truth into those things.
So take success and take the same deep idols and the after confessing the sin you run to the Lord as a having Comfort idolatry and say Lord I don't need to keep working like this so that I can maximize joy and pleasure on the weekend I don't need to work so hard and run myself into the ground so I can have this retirement that I probably shouldn't be idolizing in the first place this something that our culture has given us but the Bible doesn't.
Lord I want to find my comfort in you Lord help me find my comfort in you so that I can work in a way that honors you that isn't chasing after comfort that if you have approval idolatry you come to the Lord and say God I don't need to work for my boss's approval I don't need my co-workers approval not enough likes not enough emails that recognize me not enough is going to ever satisfy me I'll find my approval in you.
Because you look at me and are satisfied because of the righteousness of Christ that's credited to my account God I look at you and I'm thankful that you approved Pro of me not because of my good works because of Jesus Christ and what he's done for me therefore I will seek to glorify you and I will not work for them if you have power idolatry you say God I don't need to get to the top I don't have to start my own business to be.
Okay because you're the Sovereign King who rules over all things and I will in in in what is hard for me submit to someone that I don't think does this as well as I do because it's good for my soul because old timely I work unto you that if you have control idolatry you might need to after you've made your confession run to Christ and say I don't God have to keep it all together Perfection is not the goal faithfulness is and I'll be faithful to what you've given me.
God take my hands off the wheel I don't have to be so controlling all the time I don't have to hold all things together because God you are sovereign and in control and I submit to you and releasing this before you that is what we have to do in order to see what's happening and my hope is that we would now having said that some of you are like that's great that's the 18th time I've heard that in the seven years of being in this Church like I I I I appreciate that and I've heard de idals and I know I know what mine are and what I would push on is.
When is the last time that you thought about your sin in light of deep idolatry when is the last time that when you got angry like this happens to me like I I teach this stuff I counsel with this stuff and all of a sudden days go by and I've been angry about a thing and I'm like why am I so angry and then finally the Lord just reveals and it's like oh yeah yeah I can understand how my proval idolatry and my control idolatry and interaction with one another affect how I respond here.
Now I'm angry here and anxious here oh yeah are we doing this I would also suggest people change and guess what you might have developed some new ones possible you may have worked for some really not great people for a very long time and power was never a thing but now it is you should continue to think through this even if you've heard this over and over again we need to do the soul work to understand what's happening beneath the surface.
So that when we read stories like this we we won't look at their Devotion to deeon and think it's so silly what we I don't I can't connect with this yes you can yes we can we just have more modern and sophisticated ways of doing it that when you read the story of how Deon falls on his face and they got to lift him up it's like how foolish is that they Falls they it's beheaded what do they do like take the Philistine 3,000 years ago form of cement and put it back together how foolish he must have looked tied all up together.
But that's what we do we take the created things in our lives and we prop them up again and again and again the Lord does work in our hearts and we keep running back to them again and again and again we do it with money we do it with sex and marriage and family and riches and success and friendship and and pleasures and we keep propping them back up we keep going back to them over and over again if I can just have more money I'll be.
Okay and it's like no you won't if I just find the right friends I'll be okay no you won't if I just if I find the right person if I find the right marriage if I can find someone else then I'll be Satisfied no you won't they never satisfy they always fail and we need to see see that so clear that God is greater and he stands before us saying worship me alone be satisfied in me alone Delight in me alone and our.
God calls us to do this and my hope is that as he knocks down the idols in our lives that we wouldn't foolishly go back to picking them up that we'd understand what's happening in our souls and the moment that we start to chase after we go no no I'll be satisfied with him because God is greater B's going to come up and we're going to take the Lord's Supper as we prepare for this my invitation to some of you is that some of you possibly have only ever worshiped created things this isn't a struggle between your worship of.
God and created things where you Haven to repent of Idols you've actually never repented you've never trusted fully in Christ you know what the Philistines should have done when when when they heard about the Israelites they should have gone and said wait you have one God and he did that to the Egyptians tell me more and upon learning they just said we'll go burned down all of these other Idols I don't want those I want you I'm not going to run to baller to to Deon to get satisfied I want to be truly satisfied in you and the.
God of the universe defeated death by dying on a cross for our sins and rising from the grave to open our eyes to a life that is not enslaved to created things but worships the one true God and is satisfied in him and that's offered to you so do not take the Lord's Supper but take Christ and believe in him and for those of us that are Christians that continually are enamored by creative things we have an opportunity right now in our hearts to prayerfully discern where are we chasing after created things how do we need to practice and believe that.
God is better when you are ready you may come to the table joyfully knowing God pays with his blood for our idolatry but he invites us back in to being fully satisfied in him so when you are ready and you've done business before the Lord in your heart come to the table if gluten-free in that corner and upstairs as well let me pray Heavenly Father may you go to work in our hearts in a way that so compel us to worship you alone may you destroy the created things we've set up in our hearts in a way where we don't run back where we.
See them lying on the ground beheaded and without hands and think no I want you instead but God we need you to work in our hearts may you do it may you be most satisfying above all things we ask in Jesus name amen.
1 Samuel 4
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
My name is Spencer I am one of the pastors here as George just said we're in the book of First Samuel we're in chapter 4 today so you can go ahead and turn there we going through the whole chapter today uh we're in a section of 1 Samuel that's often called The Ark narrative It Centers on the Ark of the Covenant now some of you may have been here a couple of years ago when we were going through the book of Exodus and you remembered as we we got to the very end how sad you were that it was coming to a close and how excited you were that we got to walk through the.
Construction of the Tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant so this may be really clear in your head others of you maybe not so much some of you may uh had a first experience with the Ark of the Covenant that I had uh when I was around 7 years old I uh I watched this uh this documentary called Indiana Jones Raiders the Lost Arc and I didn't know what the ark was but that was a big part of the movie and the Nazis are trying to get a hold of the Ark.
So they can harness its power so they can win World War II so when it gets to the end and they finally find the ark uh I was not prepared for what happened next I uh and I've been told that I that I ruin a lot of older movies which I think is more your fault than mine because if it's older than 10 years old I I I feel like I get to ruin them but I won't ruin it cuz if some of you may have not seen it.
But let's just say the ark is very serious and using it and misusing it for personal power and gain goes very very poorly for the Nazis and it left it seared an image in my head at 7 years old that very much scarred me for years to come and understanding this is a very serious object and a lot of times if you have any background in uh biblical background that is attached to a movie or a book when we're preaching we're having to undo some of that.
Because a lot of times it's like well that actually isn't what happened well that's not actually what if if your first encounter with the ark was that movie we can build upon that that actually does it takes it very very seriously and that's what we're going to see in this story today but before we jump into this story in a section called The Ark narrative I want to to help help us remember what the ark uh is so I got a picture that we used in The Book of Exodus this is a artist uh rendering from the description that we get in the book of Exodus of what the Ark of the Covenant would have.
Looked like it was made of gold and acacia wood uh you see there's gold rings and and poles that would carry it because you could not touch the ark because if you did you would die uh it is a box that has contain stuff contained in it it had the uh the the The Ten Commandments on the stone tablets it had the jar of Mana it had um Aaron's staff it had these objects that reminded them of what God did and bringing them out of slavery into the promised land.
But it also on the very top uh had what's called The Mercy Seat this was the seat where uh the presence of God resided uniquely amongst his people and this was uh in the uh innermost part of the Tabernacle called the holy of holies and there was great separation from the people uh and the Ark of the Covenant because this is where God's presence resided it was such a holy place that only once a year could a high priest go in there on the day of atonement it's called yam kapor and there are a lot of rituals he had to do to even enter into uh the presence of the.
Lord to minister and do his duties and if he didn't do this correctly he would die and we see some history that points to that as well that the Ark of the Covenant was a very holy holy object because God ruled and reigned from amongst his people and really this is the centerpiece that really the nation of Israel comes to to Worship the Lord that wherever the ark is in the Tabernacle that's where the Lord the people come together to Worship the.
Lord so this is very Central to their identity as Israelites as belonging to the Lord this is Central to their worship and it is is very holy we need that understanding because what we're going to see today with that kind of knowledge makes this story a tragedy in fact it's one of the most tragic stories in the Old Testament so we're going to see that play out but also we're going to see the importance of God's presence with his people and my hope is is that we as we.
See this in the story we'll be able to reflect and see how important the presence of God is for us today as Christians so we pray and we'll walk through this together heavenly father I pray that you would help us see clearly your word we would see the wonderful truth that our whole life should be aimed at being in your presence at seeking your presence and that would change us but Lord give us ears to hear and eyes to see we ask this in.
Jesus name amen all right we're going to pick up in the second half of verse one when it says now Israel went out to battle against the Philistines okay first time we've seen the Philistines show up in 1 Samuel we're going to see more of the Philistines this is one of the the biggest enemies of the people of God they are a see people that migrated that that settled on the coast and started to conquer different parts of the promised land and they're going to keep showing up as they're at war with the Israelites which is where we pick up it says they encamped at Ebenezer this is the Israelites and the Philistines encamped at.
Apek the Philistines Drew up in line against Israel and when the battle spread Israel was defeated before the Philistines who killed about 4,000 men on the field of battle so Israel suffers a big defeat now when you read the book of Joshua which precedes this book it tells the story of how they settled the promised land uh one of the things that's very clear is that when the people of God are in right relationship with the Lord it goes well for them on the battlefield.
When they are not in right relationship with the Lord it goes very poorly for them on the battlefield which leads them to question and wonder what happened in verse three when the people came to the camp the Elders of Israel said why has the Lord defeated us today before the Philistines so they rightfully understand the Lord is the one that gives victory in battle and the Lord is the one who sovereignly ordains defeat in battle so they understand based on their history this is what.
God does what happened why did this happen and it seems that they believe the reason they lost to the Philistines is because they did not have the ark it says let us bring the the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord here from Shiloh that it may come Among Us and save us from the power of our enemies so they think wait wait the real reason we lost is we didn't have the ark if we had the Ark of the Covenant.
If we had God's presence with us we would have won this battle they don't for a moment consider the possibility that maybe they have sin that needs to be repented of they don't consider their history remembering they would have known the stories that come from The Book of Joshua they would have known the story of how they won at Jericho and then they lost at the Battle of AI because there was sin in the camp amongst the people they don't consider that.
For a moment what they want to do is they want a shortcut to Victory they don't want to do they don't want to do the tough work of examining their own lives in their heart and examining the people they want a shortcut they're looking for the cheat code when I was a kid I played video games and I played a game called Mario Kart and I thought I was good at it and I had friends that would come over and we' be playing on N64.
And then I would be going off doing the race and they would just run into the wall over and over again and I was like what are you doing and then all of a sudden there was a glitch in the game they hopped over the wall and they ended up winning and I was like what is this you violated the spirit of the game it's not the way it's supposed to be and that's the that's human nature we want shortcuts we want a cheat go we want a way to to to do not do the tough work.
But do the easy route in order to get what we want and that is what the Israelites have done they are so wward they they choose the shortcut and in arrogance their their idea is we will barge into the holy of holies we will take the ark from the holy of holies bring it out of the Tabernacle and bring it to the battlefield which remember remember how holy that place was remember that only once a year a high priest could go in there.
If he did all the right rituals they bypass all of them because what they have done is they've reduced the presence of God and the Arc of the Covenant down to a good luck charm if we have this good luck charm on the battlefield that's what's going to help us win verse four so the people sent to Shiloh and brought from there the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord of hosts who is enthroned on the cherubin and the two sons of Eli half n and Phineas were there with the Ark of the Covenant of.
God when you get more context and we begin to see really how Wicked This is because if you remember a few weeks ago when chat was explaining the story of the two sons of Eli we saw how Wicked their actions were in corrupting the priesthood that they were uh disobeying the Lord and showing contempt for the offerings the people would bring their sacrifices and they were taking the fatten portions which were meant for the Lord and they were seizing it by force from the people not only were they showing content.
For the Lord they were abusing their power as priests we also read that they were sleeping around with the uh with the women who served at the Tabernacle we saw this picture of how corrupt the priesthood had gotten how corrupted worship had gotten and the Tabernacle and these men are now leading the charge with the Ark of the Covenant so we see how Wicked This is and we're about to see that God is not a good luck charm and the Ark will not be misused.
For personal gain they are invoking the power of God in a way that is a Blasphemous reduction of God and his presence down to a good luck charm and that is going to go poorly verse 5 as soon as the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord came into the camp all Israel gave a mighty shout so that the Earth resounded and when the Philistines heard the noise of the shouting they said what does this Great shouting in the camp of the Hebrews mean they had just won the battle they were victorious and they're wondering why are they.
So confident says and when they learned the Ark of the Lord had come to the camp the Philistines were afraid for they said a God has come into the camp and they said woe to us for nothing like this has happened before woe to us who can Deliver Us From The Power of these Mighty Gods these are the gods who struck the Egyptians with every sort of plague in the wilderness take courage and be men oh Philistines lest you become slaves to the Hebrews as they have been to you be men and fight.
So they kind of know the history history of Israel they miss on some details they know that the ark is Holy they know that with the ark with God and his people that they defeated the Egyptians they get it some of the details wrong they think it's many gods they misunderstand it's one they think it happened in the wilderness you know it happened in Egypt but they understand this is a big deal but they also the Philistines to their credit are courageous men and they're like we're going to fight not going to be slaves let's go.
Verse 10 so the Philistines fought and Israel Was Defeated and they fled every man to his home and there was a very great Slaughter for 30,000 foot soldiers of Israel fell and the Ark was captured and the two sons of Eli hafni and Phineas died so God finally enacts this judgment this prophecy that Eli's Sons would die and I appreciate how the pastor ALG uh summarizes this he says the Israelites thought they could trust in the presence of the Ark while paying no attention to God's demands they thought they could trust in his presence and do it their own way and not heed the Commandments of.
God the teachings of God the demands of God and they blaspheme the presence of God and it ends up in a massive defeat and more to the point the ark is captured which means that the unique presence of God amongst his people has departed verse 12 a man of Benjamin ran from the battle line and came to Shiloh the same day with his clothes torn and with dirt on his head which that's a sign of lament he would have torn his clothes he would have put dirt on his head this is lamenting and morning.
Verse 13 when he arrived Eli was sitting on his seat by the road watching for his heart trembled for the Ark of God Eli knows how big of a deal it is that the ark left that he's trembling in fear awaiting news and when the man came into the City and told the news all the city cried out when Eli heard the sound of the outcry he said what is this uproar then the man hurried and came and told Eli now Eli was 98 years old and his eyes were set.
So that he could not see so Eli is very old at this point 98 years old he's blind which means he's at the roadside he's just listening just trying to hear any bit of news that's coming in and the first thing that he hears is a loud lament a loud cry and you have to think in that moment that his stomach just drops what has happened the benjaminite comes to give him the news in verse 16 it says the man said to Eli I am he who has come from the battle I fled from the battle.
Today and he said how did it go my son he who brought the news answered and said Israel has fled before the Philistines and there has also been a great defeat among the people your two sons also half and Phineas are dead and the Ark of God has been captured as soon as he mentioned the Ark of God Eli fell over backward from his seat by the side of the gate and his neck was broken and he died for the man was old and heavy he judged Israel 40 years.
So Eli gets three sets of bad news the first Israel suffered a massive defeat tens of thousands of Israelites are dead on the battlefield second second his two sons which they all we see is is the their lack of character their wickedness but they are his sons he remembers them as children he remembers them growing up his two sons are gone but the news that really moves him the the news that deeply affects him and deep distress is the fact that the Ark of.
God is gone and that new overwhelms him so much that he falls out of his seat and being old and heavy and commentators have noted this and I think they're on to something that he's probably likely heavy because he too participated in the wickedness of eating the fatten parts of the sacrifices that he was not supposed to that he permitted by letting his sons corrupt the priesthood that he participated this and the irony of this is that all of that weight that he carried in Rebellion against.
God descends upon him as he falls backwards and his neck hits the ground and he breaks his neck and he dies and then God also fulfills the prophecy that we saw earlier that when Eli's Sons die he does too and after 40 Years of judging with poor leadership and permitting sin in the priesthood God has brought his judgment and it's devastating for the entire family which is where chapter 4 actually takes a really unique turn it it it goes in a direction that you wouldn't expect that I wouldn't expect and it zooms in on something very specific amongst all the different things that are going on the thousands of Israelites that are dead in the.
Battlefield Eli and his sons dying it focuses on the wife of one of the sons of Eli verse 19 now his daughter-in-law the wife of Phineas was pregnant about to give birth when she heard the news the Ark of God was captured and that her father-in-law and her husband were dead she bowed and gave birth for her pains Came Upon her so upon hearing this news she goes into some type of complicated labor where she is actually going to die verse 20 and about the time of her death the woman attending her said to Hero not be afraid.
For you have borne a son but she did not answer or pay attention and she named the child kabad saying the glory y has departed from Israel because the Ark of God had been captured and because of her father-in-law and her husband and she said the glory has departed from Israel for the Ark of God has been captured and that's how this story ends now kabad literally in the Hebrew it just means no glory and it's this picture of the glory has Departed.
Now names are significant in the Bible they they intentionally their names have meaning and kabad captures the in this tragic birth the greater tragedy that has unfolded and really the biggest tragedy that's happened in Israel since they settled the promised land hundreds of years ago but just as Eli was mainly concerned with the Ark of God being captured that is the most shock shocking part for her and the most tragic part for she names her son iabat the glory has departed and she is in death acknowledging this great tragedy.
Now it's hard for us I think to picture the loss of this and I tried to think of what it would be like to lose something like that in our own culture I talked with Chad about this I like is there anything that that would help us understand what losing the ark meant and there really isn't try thinking through the Declaration of Independence being stolen the Constitution being stolen for some of you maybe it's Howard's Rock like I just but there really is nothing that would devastate us like what's happening here this is a massive event it's huge.
And if you remember the book of Exodus and how it ended the final passage of the the book of Exodus if you remember this the glory of the Lord this wonderful event where it fills the Tabernacle and how beautiful and how wonderful how glorious this was and now the glory of God has departed has left meaning meaning the presence of God has departed meaning that it's very likely it's very likely they believe God has abandoned them in judgment and I think they would be right to believe that that is why this is such a devastating scene I mean it's.
So devastating that this is also the the the Tabernacle has been here in Shiloh for almost 400 years Shiloh is no more after this we don't know what happened we catch hints that it was destroyed historically they think possibly the Philistines came in and burn it down possibly the people just in lament tore it down but this the end of Shiloh so this is a devastating event and yet in the midst of this Devastation it focuses in on a nameless woman and you might think.
Okay well I mean we get this Cliffhanger about kabad I wonder how he's going to show up later he doesn't he's not important at all he gets mentioned one other time and it's just in relation to his brother just to help Orient the story he's insignificant but the reason that it focuses in on this ending is to show how utterly devastating it was for the presence of God to leave the people this is a massive event and it is a tragedy.
So what I want to do for us is I want for us to reflect upon that reality the importance of the presence of God and I want us to think about this in a few different ways here's the first if you are not a Christian My Hope Is that that we can compel you to see how wonderful and how glorious the presence of God is that we can help you see how beautiful it is to live a life seeking the presence of.
God that we have a God that took on human flesh and dwelt Among Us that Jesus embodied a life that we could not live and he died to death on the cross that we deserve he rose from the resurrection to conquer death so that we could be ushered into the presence of God in part now but in full later and the journey of seeking the presence of God is wonderful it is beautiful so much so that if you didn't have this presence it would be devastating have you ever had a friend or a family member that died that you just I mean you felt their absence like you you get together.
For a meal and you see that empty seed and you just you feel it you feel their absence the reason that you feel their absence is because when they were with you their presence was so good you're just you're reminded of just how wonderful it was to have them in your life that right there is a small picture of what life with God is like like that his presence is so wonderful that you don't want to imagine life without him you don't want to imagine what it would be like to not.
See how wonderful he is to experience his comfort and his strength and his power and his Mercy to experience that when you sin when you fall short that his blood covers Us that we have fellowship with him because of what he does for us that his presence is that good the Theologian a w toer once said nothing in or of this world measures up to the simple pleas pleasure of experiencing the presence of God and the reality is is that we come into this world trying to find that pleasure in.
So many lesser things and the reason we move from thing to thing to thing to thing from activity activity activity from person to person to person is because they can never satisfy but the presence of God does that's how huge this is and as Christians we only get to experience that in part now but as we saw as we finished the book of Revelation just a short time ago that our entire lives are aimed at making it before the presence of.
God to see him in full that that eternity that awaits us is far better than anything this world has to offer so my hope is that as you walk with us and I hope that you do that you will begin to see how wonderful the presence of God is that he is worthy of your life and your faith and your surrendering to leave this life behind to find your hope in him in seeking his presence that's the first thing I want us to.
See the second is that if you are a Christian I want us to receive the warning do not use the presence of God for personal gain God is not a good luck charm he's not a good luck charm to get what we want in this life that is blasphemy that is taking the Lord's holy name in vain and the Heart posture that exists and existed in the Israelites that they would arrogantly barge into the throne room they would barge in and take from the holy of holies the presence of.
God for their own personal gain that posture still exists today how often do we see politicians that invoke their faith and talk about Jesus and hold up Bibles in order to get votes and I'm not saying that every politician that's ever talked about their faith isn't genuine but boy oh boy it's clear a lot aren't that there is no fear of there's no fear of God in that approach to to misuse the presence of God in your life and speak up about in a way to gain it's Insidious it's evil Christians do this in a lot of different ways one of the ways that I.
See it happen is someone who's making a decision for their own personal what they deem as a gain for their own personal benefit when other people are trying to counsel them and they say no no no God told me no no no the the Holy Spirit showed this to me told no no God would never he he would want me to be happy with fill in the blank and the name of God and a relationship with God and therefore the presence of.
God is invoked as a means to get what you want not thinking about wait a second that the Holy Spirit embodies the Church we have this individualist individualistic mindset that we it's just us and God that's not how it is that we are amongst the body when you have other Christians that are trying to counsel you especially when they're pointing to his word and you say oh no no no I know God is cool with what I'm doing woe to us.
When we do this Christians do this when they live a good moral life for the sake of gaining blessing that I want to do the commands in order that I might be blessed and again you're invoking following his Commandments which is calling upon your relationship with him and his presence in order for personal gain see Prosperity preachers do this the false prophets who sell out Arena tours dangling faith in front of people for cash there's no fear of God in them and this awful heresy that's.
So widespread in this culture of people that pedal pedestal the word of God and dangling Faith out in front of others for Earthly gain I'll give you one more one of the things that I've noticed is that there are in the South particularly parents when they become parents start to take Faith in Church very seriously and then the moment the last kid graduates from high school they begin to f fade away and what that shows often not going to speak for every person that's ever done this.
But what that shows often is is that Church and God was a means of raising good moral children and the moment that you've done that God is useless to you we should be mindful of that there I could go on and on there are lots of different ways that we misuse the presence of God for our own personal gain and we need to understand that's blasphemous that is as arrogant as them going into the holy of holies and taking the ark.
So we should consider our own heart in this and here's the third thing I want us to see today some of you may right now feel abandoned by God some of you may feel that God's presence in your life has left with no certainty of his return and if you've been following Jesus long enough this is going to sound familiar there are times when we feel like the presence of God and everything that I've been talking about just feels so distant there are times times.
When you talk to the Lord when you're praying and you just wonder am I just throwing empty words into empty air there are times where God feels so distant there are times where the name kabad feels so appropriate because it feels like his glory feels so absent and if you follow Christ long enough you will experience likely that a marathon long faith that we have on this journey there will be times where you feel the distress of God God just feeling distant and the next question that I get.
When I talk to folks that are feeling this is why why does God's presence feel so distant why can I feel the presence of God if God loves me why does he feel so distant why does he feel so foreign I want to feel his presence I want to know him and there are certainly a few different biblical reasons that I can point to for Why God might act like this in certain seasons of life but the reality is is very often I don't know why and sometimes you might get that answer later on and sometimes you might not get that answer at all I don't know why.
But as opposed to using the rest of our time to try to understand why I'd rather be more practical and tell you what to do if you're in that state if you're in that state now or if you will end up in that state in the future I want to give you three very practical things that I picked up from a pastor I used to know that I think are helpful if you're in a season where the presence of God As a Christian feels.
So distant the first is seek seek though sometimes God feels distant it feels like his presence has been removed from us we as Christians are still called to seek him and you might respond and say why would I seek a God who doesn't want to seem found right now why would I seek after God I feel so lonely right now in the aftermath of the devastation of Jerusalem the Prophet Jeremiah has these words from the book of Lamentations chapter 3 he says.
For the Lord will not cast off forever but though he cause grief he will have compassion according to the abundance of a steadfast love for he does not afflict from his heart or grieve the children of men says he will not cast off forever though it feels like that right now because that may be the reality that he is distant in a way that you can't see him like you want to Behold Him you want to see him you want to experience him.
When you pray you want to feel feel his presence when you read his word you want to feel something you want to be right here but he's not cast off forever he's right here with you and I so appreciate that he he does mention though he causes grief and our God does this sometimes in ways we don't understand he will have compassion according to his steadfast love and I appreciate this verse 33 I Love Actually what the csb the Christian Standard Bible says it says.
For he does not en Joy bringing Affliction or suffering on mankind God doesn't enjoy this he has Sovereign purposes for you in this but it does not bring him joy and you will not be cast off forever I love what the pastor Matt Smur says he says here's the point if you're going through a rough time the God of Heaven is not messing with you he's not playing some cruel Cosmic game he finds no joy none in watching you suffer Christian believe that I don't know why this is happening right.
Now but God finds no joy in it and he has greater purposes in it and you may not feel his presence but he is with us God May indeed as David says in multiple Psalms hide his face from us hide the better part of his presence from us in ways we don't understand but David also says in Psalm 137 where shall I go from your spirit or where shall I flee from your presence if I Ascend to Heaven you are there.
If I make my bed and shol you are there he knows that though sometimes we can't clearly see God as we seek him as we seek to savor him to love him to worship him he's right here the whole time and yes I hope hope that he comes to the center of you in a way that you feel his presence but don't for a moment think that he has abandoned you cuz he hasn't our God is with us and as David says in Psalm 30 weeping may t.
For the night but joy comes in the morning I am Telling You for the Christian that is true I don't know how long the night is going to be but I do know that the morning is going to break and you are going to feel this compassion against you are going to feel his presence again and if you're in the middle of a season like that seek Him seek Him don't stop seek Him do the things that are good for your soul read the Scriptures even.
When you feel nothing seek him pray talk to God even when it feels like you don't even know if he's listening as doubts and lies come in that says he doesn't care pray seek him sing worship even if your heart feels nothing sing seek the Lord the second thing to do is to self-examine self-examine there may be reasons that God feels distant that you do not know there are some times though there are some situ situations where the presence of God feeling distant is self-inflicted that you have done things that have has led to this that was the story of the Israelites it was by their actions that the presence of.
God left them so we do things sometimes that lead to this in a way that pursuing sin and keeping it hidden numbs our soul to where we really can't sense God and the reality is we should self examine we should look at our own Hearts we should try to see as Psalm 139: 23- 24 say David says search me oh God and know my heart try me and know my thoughts and see if there be any Grievous way in me and Lead Me in the way Everlasting we should we should pray pray that like search me oh.
God know my heart see if there be any Grievous way within me and if there are Grievous ways expose them bring them into the light confess them before the Lord confess them to other Christians in your in your group begin to walk in the light because sometimes the choices that we make and the sin that we hide numbs us in a way where we can't see God very clearly and we should take account of that and we should repent and we should run back to.
God but let me be clear sometimes and a lot of times it's not hidden sin you're doing all the things Faithfully following Christ I'm sure you've got sin but you walk in accountability you repent of it and God still feels distant here's the third thing you can do is stare I'm made these all S's so you could remember that super Baptist of us seek self-examine stare stare deeply into the truths of God even when he doesn't feel present stare deeply into.
God because he's always present if you are in Christ Romans 3 8: 38-39 is true for you this is true 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 there is nothing that separates you from the love of God he may not be in full Focus view right.
Now but he's right here and he's not going anywhere he still loves you the God who gave up his life to bring you into his presence nothing will separate you from him he's here and though he feels far and though his love feels far the objective true reality in spite of our feeling is that he is here the love that saved you the love that redeemed you the love that's holding you on right now now and the love that will carry you home is still present in your life.
If if you're a Christian if you're a follower of Christ and you're in a season where you cannot sense his presence I don't know why he's hidden the better parts of his presence from you but I know good and well from the Scriptures he is with you so stare don't stop stare deeply into the presence of God you know sometimes uh if you're in a place like this if you're a season like this that trying to stare deeply into God is like looking at one of those magic eyes one of those Magic Eye posters do you.
Remember those did I put did I put a picture in there on the slide is there a magic gu poster put that up there if I did yeah I did okay I did the right thing okay so if you're not familiar with these these were like at every elementary middle school classroom that I was ever in and the point of these is if you stare at it long enough or Chad said there's some way of doing it look at your nose I don't know.
But I never figured these out so I would look at these kind of posters and I would just see nothing I still see nothing and then all of a sudden someone says oh I see it it's a whale and it's like really I got nothing I just I mean I see nothing and sometimes when you're in a season where you can't sense the presence of God you be in community group and someone's got the Scriptures open they're just saying oh isn't.
God so good look at this truth look how wonderful he is our God loves us so much he's so powerful he's so mighty he's so Sovereign and I'm open up the Bible and you're just like I don't see it right now I don't know I I just can't see God clearly right now and sometimes that's what it feels like but what I'm here to tell you is don't stop staring you belong to God you are marked by him and one day he's going to break through and one day you are going to.
See him clearly you're going to feel his presence you're going to feel his love you want to feel his power God is going to break through so keep staring seek self-examine stare and you will see him clearly again the bad news for the Israelites is that their sin led to the presence leaving the good news is in a few chapters the presence of God is going to return the better news for us as Christians is that though we may be in a season where he feels far and distant he never left.
So keep persevering and stare deeply until we experience his presence again Matt's going to come up and we're just going to sing one song This Is A Hymn that we don't often sing It's called I stand amazed and I want us to stand I want us to sing this and you may be a Christian right now that is so feeling the presence of God and everything I just said just feels foreign it's no I just he feels so present I'm so ready to sing what I would encourage you do is to sing.
But in the moments where there's pauses between the words would you pray for the rest of your Church family would would you pray for the Christians in this room right now that want to feel the presence of God but they just can't and if you're one of those Christians right now I I want you to sing you may not feel the joy of the Lord in your heart you may not feel his presence the part of staring until you see his presence again is singing.
So I want you to sing and if you're not a Christian I want you to hear the message in this song and I want you to surrender your life to the God who's worthy of your life so that you can experience the presence of God from now into eternity let me pray Heavenly Father may you go to work on our hearts right now may you heal may we feel your presence may we worship and Delight in you Lord would you work mightily by the power of the Holy Spirit in us we ask this in.
Jesus name amen.
1 Samuel 3
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning my name is Chad I'm one of the pastors here if you'll grab a Bible and go to First Samuel we are working our way through the book of 1 Samuel and we in chapter 3 we have been seeing the growth and the development of Samuel and last week we saw uh judgment being declared against Eli who was the high priest and his two sons hne and Phineas and we are picking up in chapter three we're going to walk all the way through chapter 3 this morning uh we are going to read one verse.
And then talk for a while and if you haven't uh you know don't get terrified that we're going to do that with every verse we're just going to do that with the first verse and then we're going to walk through the rest of the story and we're going to make two big observations from this text this morning the first one is the importance the value the goodness of the word of God God and the second one is the importance and the value and the goodness of someone to declare the word of.
God so we're going to see that we need something to say and we need someone to say it and that's what we're going to be looking at as we work through this text this morning that that's the way God works he gives something to say and he gives someone to say it so um let's ask the Lord for help and we'll jump right in to chapter three Lord we pray that we you would bless this time as we uh seek to Value the word of.
God and to grow our appreciation for the word of God we ask that even in this moment uh that we would do that that we would Place great value on your word in Jesus name amen now the boy Samuel was ministering to the Lord in the presence of Eli and the word of the Lord was rare in those days there was no frequent Vision so this is setting us up a little bit giving us a bit of a setting of what's going on here and we're told that the boy Samuel.
Now that word translated boy boy is actually a decent translation of that word in that it does not give us a clear indication of how old he is at all we can say it's a boy and this is an infant and we can say the boys are back in town and that those aren't infants at all they might act childish but they're not infants that's the way this word is used this this Hebrew word it is the word that describes Moses as he floats down the the Nile and is picked up by Pharaoh's daughter it is the word that describes uh Joseph.
When he is 17 it is a word that describes several people who are committing uh High crimes in the Bible that they are referred to as this it's young man as a way to translate it it it it's a wide range so we know that he's been growing up we know that his he now has five younger siblings um I would Place him somewhere let's just say teenager he's probably in that zone could could press a little past teenager could be a little younger.
But it doesn't seem like it I think we're picking up with a 13 to 18 year old okay that's what boy means that's what we're looking at Samuel's been growing he's ministering to the Lord in the presence of Eli but then it says this and the word of the Lord was rare in those days there was no frequent Vision now as you all well remember from last week in chapter two a man of God shows up and and declares this Proclamation against the house of Eli.
But the text is like don't get confused that doesn't happen often that's not a consistent thing the word of the Lord is rare we don't have someone who's consistently speaking on behalf of the lord it's not like when Moses was here and at the tend of meeting he actually met with God we have the tent of meeting but there's no there's been no meetings and actually as we to found out in Chapter 2 the tent of meeting has been the tent of a whole lot of really terrible things the priests have been doing that's what's been happening here and it says that the word of.
God is rare that there's no frequent Vision that we're in a time of drought and this is actually one of the things that God will at times it's a it's a punishment it's a judgment it's certainly bad add it's this is no good thing to have a drought of the word of God in Amos he actually says I'm going to send a famine but not a famine of food not a drought of water but of the word of God and you'll travel all across the country seeking it and you won't find it.
So in those days they knew what famine was they knew what hunger was they knew what was like even even for the people who struggle with hunger in our country there's food all around them but when they had famines if I don't have food my neighbor doesn't have food we we have to move we have to go to a different country we have to go to a different place we have to go see if it's been raining somewhere they had to travel.
For it there was no hope in the middle of a famine for there to suddenly be food that's not how it worked and so we're told that they're in a season of a famine of the word of God now we live in an interesting time because we have more access to the word of God you have more access to the word of God than anyone at any point in any time in history you right now on your cell phone can have multiple English translations you can have translations in other languages on your cell phone you can have someone read it to you on your cell phone you can be like I don't like the way.
That person's voice sounds and pick a different person to read it to you on your cell phone you can have multiple copies of the word of God nobody's going to try to take it from you we print them out and we we hand these out you can have this if you don't own a Bible there's a blue Bible sitting in the chair in front of you take that home we want you to have a Bible we want you to read it often that's yours it's a gift to you we want you to have the Bible we have access to the Bible I think we have more access to the Bible than like I said anytime.
In any history and maybe we have a very low appreciation for the Bible I think we're a little bit in our approach to the Bible like we are as Americans that we actually don't understand what the word famine means and I actually think we don't really understand what it's like to not have access to the Bible but historically and globally lack of an access to the word of God has been common and the idea that this is a right of ours that will never be taken away or can never be infringed upon is not true at this time they would have had had copies some copies of the the word given to Moses they would.
Have had some in the ark that's going to show up later in this chapter and then a whole lot in the book of Samuel it doesn't seem like they were reading it they certainly weren't following it but you needed someone to show up and prophetically speak the word throughout the Old Testament and then the word continues to develop and that gets written down in the time that Jesus is Alive walking on Earth his ministry here they would have had some written Scrolls at uh that you could go and they would read them.
When you gathered at a synagogue but the idea that you would have that at home was not a thing young boys would memorize the first five books if you were good at it you could go into the priesthood and memorize the rest of them a lot of them like Peter James and John they were like hey maybe you should fish but they would memorize the Scriptures then we went into the Middle Ages where they worked hard to translate their Scriptures were originally written in the language people used they translated it into Latin.
Because that was one of the languages people used but eventually it got to where Latin was what they considered the the holy good language and people didn't speak it anymore but that's what you would show up you would show up and they would have a Catholic mass a Latin mass and they would read in a language you didn't know and the reformers begin to press on this and say no we need it back in the vernacular we need it back in the language that people speak and they were killed.
For trying to do that Wickliffe translated into English he died but later they were like no actually he shouldn't have done that he's a heretic they dug his bones up and burned them they got to tendale first he was translating into English they strangled him and then burned him Martin Luther was working to get it into to German this was a thing that happened in the Reformation that they were fighting so that they could have the word of God in Geneva once they were they were this is where Calvin was they would on Sunday they would gather at Sunrise there was a sermon at 9: there was a sermon in the middle of the afternoon.
They had catechism where they trained children and then they had a sermon in the evening and then they had sermons at sunrise on Monday Wednesday and Friday where Luther was they would have multiple sermons like that on Sunday and then they would have three or four on different days during the week at different times in the morning at lunchtime in the evening they were gathering like this to study the word of God repeatedly to hear sermons proclaimed repeatedly because they understood the value of what it was like to not have it and the value of what it was like to have it we ought to Value the word we ought to meditate on it we.
Ought to memorize it we ought to study it when we come in here on Sundays we ought to give our attention to it this should not be the place where we plan our weeks do our meal planning play uh games on our phone that we ought to focused now some of you are using your phone to to look at your Bible I do not do that because I will be looking at my Bible and then I will think I wonder what that word means.
And then I will look it up and once I'm on the internet I might go anywhere and I'll realize I've suddenly learned more about foreign policy because I suddenly was I just was like okay hold on so there are many times in the morning where I will turn my phone off throw it away from me put it so far Out Of Reach just so that I at least have to go you're reaching for your phone don't do it so maybe you need to have a printed Bible.
But we need to have wrapped attention and appreciation for the word we ought to care this is one of the reasons why we as a Church read through whole books of the Bible this is why we start off so often by saying get your Bible out open to this page we want to work through books of the Bible together we want to care about the Bible we want you to hold the Bible look at the Bible read the Bible if we say something up here that doesn't make any sense we want you to be going that doesn't make any sense that's not what the text says this is why in our in our uh Community.
Groups throughout the week we get back together and we look at the same passage we're trying to study and grow in this together but we want to hold this in high honor and we want to appreciate the fact that we are not in a famine of the word of God the thing that we lack is hunger for the word of God and we want to be people who hunger for it and appreciate it I understand that many of you are busy with life most of us are busy.
Because we have filled our life with things if you were to say I am too busy to read the Bible I would respond to you that I've never actually met a person where that was true I think you have had time to do that in this past week you just have to filled your time with other things that are less important I do know of a mother at one point who had a bunch of small children and she said I have found that I don't have time to read the Bible like I want to.
So I've started memorizing it that way while I'm doing all the things I have to do during the day I at least have some verses in my head that I'm meditating on and memorizing so that by the end of the week I've memorized this many verses this much of a section of the text because I am having a hard time with my schedule fitting it in the way I would like to so if you said I'm having a hard time reading the Bible.
But I'm memorizing it I would say good but the idea that we just don't have time is really that we don't have it valued where it ought to be and we ought to be a people who value the word of God and we ought to understand that there are times where the word is rare and we don't live there so let's praise the Lord that it's not the case here and let's be people who love the word grow in the word.
So in the word believe the word meditate on the word memorize the word share the word with each other we're going to talk through some of that in our groups this week there are people in your group who do consistently read their Bibles and have figured out how to to build their schedule around that and for those of you who are like I've never really done this I don't really know how to do that would love for you to get with them this week and as yall discuss try to figure out how do I build this into my life I talked to people periodically who were like man I just I got all these big.
Decisions ision I'm having to make talk to men who are trying to lead their families and like I got all this stuff I'm trying to do and they don't read their Bibles and I'm always like good luck there's so much wisdom there's so much hope there's so much grounding there's so much uh that calls you to things that matter in the word of God that helps you reorient your life around things that are not stupid and that so much of us are just building our life around what all the other Americans around us tell us we should build our life around and we.
Look foolish and we have access to the word and should love the word study the word memorize the word and know that there are times where that is lacking okay I could keep saying all kinds of things but I will not verse two that's the setting a place where there is no word of God now I will tell you this in your Old Testament the the Jewish authors and this is true for the whole Bible but it's really true for for Jewish writers.
When they tell you a story they do not waste any time they don't give you details that don't matter they they they are very succinct in their storytelling this is Americans sometimes will be like well what about this what about that why isn't this here I wonder what that looked like and it's like yeah it doesn't matter they didn't tell you it doesn't matter you don't have to know that imagine it however you like but that that it's not there it doesn't matter.
But the stuff they do tell you matters and when it starts off by saying the word of the Lord was rare in those days it'd be like if you were starting to watch a movie and they were like in a time when all the heroes were dead and darkness Ruled the Land I'm like M I bet there's going to be a hero and he's going to fight some Darkness you guys like it's it's already told me what's coming and so when it says the word of.
God was rare it's like oh I think maybe we're about to fix this problem I don't want to give it away but we're about to fix this problem all right verse two at that time Eli whose eyesight had begun to grow dim so that he could not see was lying down in his own place the lamp of God had not yet gone out and Samuel was lying down in the temple of the Lord where the Ark of God was okay Eli's high priest he's very old he's going blind the next time they give us some descriptions about us They tell him tell us that he's very old he has fully gone blind and he's very.
Heavy so if you're picturing Eli old heavy can hardly see Samuel is growing in height stature and age and it says that Eli's in his place we don't know exactly where his place is but it tells us that AMU was sleeping in the temple I didn't know that was a thing so they had the Tabernacle set up the Tabernacle had the holy place and the most holy place in the mo Most Holy place there was the the veil that separated that only the high priest would go in there once a year and that's where the ark was.
When it says he's sleeping in the temple where the ark was I think he's in the Holy place not the most holy place I don't think he's actually where only the high priest went once a year because God says he'll kill you you if you do that so I think it just means he's near it rather than in in there he's just in the temple where the ark is because that's where they would delineate the temples where the ark is so I think he's there the the lamp hasn't gone out means that they lit these this lamp it was a uh seven oil burner lamp they lit it at night it would go out sometimes.
In the morning so middle of the night Eli's laying down Samuel's laying down middle of the night samel was in the temple all right then the Lord called Samuel and he said here I am and ran to Eli and said here I am for you called me but he said I did not call lie down again so he went and lay down Samuel hears the Lord calling him he pops up presumably out of sleep goes Eli's calling me I don't know how often this would happen.
But if Eli's eyesight is really dim it's possible that anytime he needed help he would holler at Sam Samu would go help him so he runs to him says basically yes sir you called me here I am you called Eli who now been woken up by Samuel presumably says no I didn't go back to bed so Samuel goes back to bed so he went and lay down verse six and the Lord called again Samuel and Samuel arose and went to Eli and said here I am.
For you my son lie down again so he does it again Samuel uh we don't know how long has happened between this we don't know if this was 5 minutes 30 minutes we don't know if Samuel went back to sleep we don't know if Eli went back to sleep but they have a repeat of this interaction in the middle of the night yes sir you called me no it didn't okay go back down all right verse 7 now Samuel did not yet know the.
Lord and the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him so Samuel who's been growing who's been developing who's been serving doesn't yet know the Lord in such a way that when he calls his calls him he recognizes his voice he doesn't yet discern the voice of the Lord he doesn't yet relate to the Lord the way he's going to he does not yet know the Lord the word has not yet been revealed to him so he go and lays back down and the.
Lord called Samuel again the third time which praise the Lord that he keeps calling like you ever finally do what the Lord's been telling you to do calls you to repent call you and you're like you've been telling me this for a long time thank you Lord thank you that you keep calling thank you that you keep coming some of you became a Christian and it was like yeah but I had this opportunity and this opportunity and this opportunity and I.
Finally like get clicked and I broke and thank you Lord for keeping after me and the Lord called Samuel again the third time and he arose and went to Eli and said here I am for you called me I appreciate this the first time that Samuel goes it says he ran the second two times it doesn't use that word uses it uses he went Samuel's thinking he a little hesitation these second two times I think by the third time he's walking going somebody's crazy either I'm slipping or he's slipping I don't know.
If you've met many teenage boys I think Sammy would be leaning towards Eli's losing it I feel pretty on my game but there's some hesitation he's he's going he's not running he like uh and you know he's also got to be thinking if I'm going crazy I can't keep waking him up you know like if he like I don't know how to help him if he's going to keep hollering but if I'm also just hearing things I can't just be like hey I'm hearing stuff again like I you know this he's just going.
Then Eli perceived that the Lord was calling the boy so it clicks for Eli third time that he's come out of the temple saying you're calling me and Eli's like I'm I'm not Eli's also convinced he's not I'm not doing this but he goes oh the Lord's calling verse n therefore Eli said to Samuel go lie down and if he calls you you shall say Speak Lord for your servant hears so Samuel went and lay down in his place so Eli who has not been a good high priest Eli who has not been a good.
Father Eli who has been corrected and has led his sons in this moment he recognizes that's the Lord and he says here's what you're going to say when the Lord calls you say speak for your servant hears you say I'm listening and I'm your I'm your servant he went and lay down in his place and the Lord came and stood calling as at other times so now we're told the Manifest presence of the Lord is here in his Temple near the ark that.
When he said that the word was rare and there had been no frequent Vision we're now being seeing that the word is present and there's a vision to accompany it that he sees him he says Samuel Samuel which is a common framework Moses Moses Abraham Abraham Jacob Jacob there's this this double call this Samuel Samuel and Samuel said speak for your servant hears then the Lord said to Samuel behold I'm about to do a thing in Israel at which the two ears of everyone who hears it will tingle that's an intro I'm just interested that.
God is so colorful in the way he describes this their two ears are going to tingle and the text says too he specifies this both ears this not their two ears are going to tingle on that day I will fulfill against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house from beginning to end and I declare to him that I am about to punish his house forever for the iniquity that he knew because his sons were blaspheming God and he did not restrain them.
Therefore I swear to the house of Eli that the iniquity of Eli's house shall not be atoned for by sacrifice or offering forever Samuel young man has been woken up multiple times in in the middle of the night he is finally standing now face to face with the Lord and the man he was just talking to Eli he's now given a message about Eli and let's take a moment to consider the message God says everything that the the man of God declared I'm going to bring to pass and his house will not be atoned.
For forever will not be atoned for by sacrifice or offering forever this was one of the things that we looked at when we were discussing in our group this past week this isn't a if they don't repent this is a passing of judgment there will be no forgiveness for this and the reality of this is the reality that moves forward into the New Testament because you you want to look at this and go wait wa wait I thought God would forgive us I thought there was there was hope I thought there was we could repent how do you get Beyond repentance the answer is you scorn his sacrifice the way in which they would gain.
Forgiveness was through the sacrifice and they had rejected the sacrifice the way in which they would have hope is through the sacrifice but they had scorned the sacrifice they had rejected the sacrifice they had Dishonored the sacrifice they had blasphemed the sacrifice and therefore there is no more forgiveness for them because the only means by which they could be forgiven they had rejected and that's the reality that moves forward into the New Testament with Christ it is not that there are some s sins that are too big to be forgiven it is that.
If you reject the opportunity for forgiveness in the sacrifice where God meets us to atone for our sin for us if we reject and blaspheme against Christ and reject him and reject the sacrifice then there is no hope for forgiveness because there is no other place for forgiveness so that's what he's saying they will not be atoned for because they've rejected my means of atonement there is no other place to go for forgiveness now that's the message who who does God tell he says I declare to him.
Verse 13 I declare to him Eli I declare to Eli that I'm about to punish his house forever he's talking to Eli Eli but who's he talking to Samuel he's not talking to Eli he's talking to Eli but he's talking to Samuel so Samuel has been given a message with implications that this is to be spread specifically to Eli God woke Samuel up multiple times and gave him a message for Eli verse 15 Samuel lay until morning then he opened the doors of the house of the.
Lord it's possible he slept it says he he lay there that word can sometimes be used for sleeping like when someone say I'm going to go lay down they don't just mean lay down they're going to go to sleep it's the same kind of way that works but it also might just mean he just lay there with a heavy message and then he says he opened the doors of the House of Eli and Samuel was afraid to tell the vision to Eli yeah have you noticed that Eli's called him my son multiple times this is who's been raising him this is who he's been studying under this is who he's been being developed by he's.
Got a horrific terrible message to give him he's young yeah I would say fear is involved here makes sense but Eli called Samuel and said Samuel my son and he said here I am and Eli said what was it that he told you do not hide it from me may God do so to you more also if you hide anything from me of all that he told you I don't exactly know the interaction and the tone of how Eli had to call Samuel to him and the the way Samuel responded.
But at some point and maybe it was already really clear to Eli but at some point Eli is well aware of the type of message that Samuel has I don't know if he kind of seemed like he was avoiding him that morning I don't know if Eli stayed awake all night too and since Samuel never came back he was like and Samuel wakes up and don't really it's like you know but at some point he says tell me everything he said and he basically places a conditional curse on him may.
God apply all of it to you if you don't tell me verse 18 so Samuel told him everything and hid nothing from him and he said it is the Lord let him do what seems good to him Eli's response humble resigned he accepts the message he says he's the Lord let him do what he sees fit and Samuel grew and the Lord was with him and he let none of his words fall to the ground that means that he confirmed him confirmed him as a prophet that's what none of his words fall to the ground that.
When Samuel would speak on behalf of God that he'd declare a thing none of that fell flat all of that was confirmed all of that came true he let none of his words fall to the ground and all Israel from Dan to beeba you're like wow all the way from Dan to Beba yeah knew that Samuel was established as a prophet of the Lord that from Dan to berseba Dan's City high up north berseba city high really low down south it's like.
When we say things like Coast to Coast you know from sea to shining sea that sort of thing it's saying they all knew all Israel from Dan to BBA knew that Samuel was established as a prophet of the Lord and the Lord appeared again at Shiloh for the Lord revealed himself to Samuel at Shiloh by the word of the Lord one of the ways that that is translated in some translation is that the Lord kept appearing or continued to appear so that.
Now the tent of meeting is a tent of meeting again the Lord is now appearing at Shiloh the Lord is now speaking through Samuel Samuel is established as a prophet chapter 4 verse 1 and the word of Samuel came to all Israel that's how chapter four starts no more drought God has called established a prophet God is meeting and declaring through Samuel the word of the Lord is coming to all Israel from Dan to berseba they know prophecy has resumed God's word has resumed his leadership has resumed through His prophets this is wonderful.
For the people of Israel because they are in the middle of a season that needs guidance the temple has been the Tabernacle has been in Shiloh for years is it's been there and they have had the the time of the judges but the judges most often were not working in a prophetic role most often they were working in a uh a leadership role they were called by the Lord to do a task they would judge and oversee the people of Israel.
But they were not always speaking prophetically to the people of Israel but now we have a a prophet the word has come and then it says something very interesting though in verse 4 I mean in chapter 4 verse1 the word of Samuel came to all Israel now is it the word of Samuel or is it the word of the Lord yes cuz we're told at the beginning that the word of the Lord was rare and then it ends with this basically it's not anymore the word of Samuel has come.
But it's like is it Samuel's words yes is it the word of the Lord yes and this is the way God chooses to work he has a message but he chooses to have a messenger he needs to talk to Eli he talks to Samuel but Samuel is going to declare the message this is how he works throughout the Old Testament this is God's method for speaking is that he takes a person and he has a Herald he uses them to Proclaim his message he does this throughout the Old Testament.
And then something very interesting happens in the New Testament we're told in Hebrews that God had spoken many times through His prophets but now he's chosen to speak through his son and so that Jesus Christ comes the word of God became flesh to dwell among us and that Jesus comes is the Fulfillment of all of these promises of all of this hope Jesus comes to rescue and to redeem and then Jesus sends out his disciples to proclaim the message that there's forgiveness in his name that he is the sacrifice that he has died on the cross was dead buried rose again has ascended to heaven and that anyone who believes in him will be saved.
Will be forgiven we'll have hope but he sends his disciples to declare this and here's how the the book of Acts puts it so often as his disciples are going and sharing this this is Acts chapter 6 verse 7 and the word of God continued to increase and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith which is great because we saw that they sometimes have problems and now they're becoming Christians it's excellent.
But that's not the point I'm trying to show you the word of God continue to increase what that's saying is that the Gospel spread that's how we would probably would word it the Gospel spread and there were many more disciples but it calls it the word of God that now there are Christians with the word of God in their mouth spreading the word of God this how it puts it in Acts chapter 12 it says but the word of God increased and multiplied and it doesn't mean the Bible got twice as big certainly they were writing letters.
But that's not what it's talking about here what it's talking about is the Gospel going forward people believing the Church growing because the Church the word of God had come to them and and now they were commissioned to go with the word of God in their mouths to people the thing that has happened in the New Testament is that we if you belong to Jesus and the word of God has come to you we are called and we are sent there is a new prophetic Ministry of Declaration of the word of.
God which is the Gospel to be spread we we say this every Sunday we say that we we know a message but we're surrounded by people who don't that the Church is plan a and there is no plan B and you are sent that's what God's been doing forever you stand in the line with Samuel when Peter preaches his first sermon at Pentecost he says we knew this was going to happen Joel told us this that the spirit was going to fall and that your Sons and Daughters will prophesy that will'll go forward proclaiming this message that this has happened.
And then they were sent I will tell you one beautiful distinction between us and Samuel Samuel had very bad news to declare Praise Jesus we have very good news to declare that there is forgiveness of sins that there is hope that there is joy that there is everlasting life that there is an eternal glorious King who has rescued us that loved us enough to die for us but far be it from us to not declare it Eli says to Samuel say speak.
For your servant hears and I think some of us right now need to take a moment to say to the Lord tell me tell me who I need to talk to I said earlier that the reformers they had four sermons on Sunday they had them all throughout the week I like preaching I'd be up for preaching more probably not that much seems like a lot we only do this once and it's not because we don't value this highly but it's because we've been sent with the word of.
God to people who do not know him and our goal is not to have you in this building a lot during the week our goal is that we would gather as people who love the word of God study the word of God Rest In Hope in the Gospel gather together to sing to worship and then we would go I don't I don't know if this is weird to you your pastors want you to join a bowling leag we want you to be a part of neighborhood watch we want you to join PTO.
And if you're like I don't like bowling I don't like PTO that's not the point it's not the point but if you've ever been a part of a PTO you know those people need Jesus if you ever been part of a neighborhood organization you know those people need the Gospel we want you to go and I I don't want you to care about the height of grass but I want you to care about the souls of the people who care about the height of grass we want your time to be taken up spent out in studying the word of.
God and then going to people who need that message you have good news to declare and y'all the people around us are miserable and lost they are without God and without hope in the world but we know we know what happens if you Scorn the sacrifice we know how good he is we know the rescue we know the hope we know the Gospel we know the joy we know the peace the rest the Comfort why are our mouths closed let's take a moment I'd like.
For you to close your eyes and if you're if you're a Christian if you know the Lord I'd like for you to to talk to him I'd like for you to ask him Lord who do I need to speak to Lord where do I need to serve we've been given a message of good news May we not keep it to ourselves so just take a moment where you are and ask that for Lord may we be a people who repent of Silence.
Lord we repent of a lack of care of your word or we ask that your spirit would move and that you would call and that we would listen some of you have neighbors and co-workers and people at the gym that you need to begin to be very intentional with and you need to tell them about the Gospel and some of you there are places in the world where the the Gospel is not heard where churches do not gather like this some of you have been feeling like maybe I'm called to Ministry maybe I'm supposed to be a pastor maybe I'm supposed to be a missionary it's tugged at you the Lord's called your name a.
Couple of times you felt it at different times at a youth camp at a retreat at a thing where you were pressed and you thought maybe I'm supposed to do that and some of you right now need to say Lord I'll go wherever you send me Lord I am your servant and I'll take whatever position you give me some of you right now need to stop thinking about this as if God has got to fill out a contract and you're going to sign it.
When you see all the details some of you need to sign your name and slide a blank sheet of paper across to the Lord and say you fill it in I'll go so God may your spirit move may we hear your voice Lord we are your servants may we serve may your blessing be on this Church for the Gospel to be proclaimed for people to believe for hope to be held out Lord we're thankful that our hope is in Christ and not in our service we're thankful that our hope is in the Gospel the blood that was shed we're thankful.
Lord that it's not about us and our ability to work and our ability to serve and our ability to declare but Lord may you by your grace Empower and send us as we have the joy of the Gospel may we spread it we ask and pray all this in Jesus name amen.
1 Samuel 2:12-36
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
My name is Chad I'm one of the pastors here grab a Bible and go to First Samuel we are working through the book of 1 Samuel together so far we have learned about elaa and his wife Hannah and Hannah was praying for a son and she was blessed eventually with a son and she named him Samuel and I don't want to give anything away but he's kind of important in this book um and we are picking up in chapter 2 where we are going to.
See the growth and development of Samuel compared to and contrasted with the uh sons of Eli hne and Phineas and we're going to see the wickedness of hne and Phineas and we're going to to kind of read through this story together make a few observations but then we will end with four observations from the text on the nature of their sin the nature of their wickedness and the nature of God's response to their sin and so that's that's what we're going to do with our time this morning will be in 1st Samuel 2: 11-36.
If you will join me in prayer father we pray that you would bless this time as we study your word help us to hear from you may your spirit guide us and lead us towards greater faith in Jesus name amen uh 1 Samuel chapter 2 verse 11 then elaa went home to Rama and the boy that's Samuel was ministering to the Lord in the presence of Eli the priest he is little he's been weaned so he's not in need of his mother anymore.
But he is a small child and he's been given to the Tabernacle at Shiloh Eli is the high priest his two sons hne and Phineas were told in chapter one were priests under him and so uh Samuel is now serving as basically a small boy participating in running tasks doing errands those sort of things developing and growing as he's been given to them at Shiloh and it's going to compare them back and forth so that's what it says in 11 it says that he's there the boy was ministering to the.
Lord in the presence of Eli the priest now the sons of Eli were worthless men they did not know the Lord and so this story is going to unfold in that manner we're going to go back and forth mostly looking at hofi and Phineas but we're going to see that contrasted with Samuel he's going to be in the background throughout and so basically it's going to say look at how awful the they are and then it's going hey look they're Samuel and that's basically how it's going to go back and forth um the sons of Eli were worthless men they did not know the.
Lord that is not how you want the Bible to describe you and it is particularly bad if you are the priests these are the priests it's not they they had one Tabernacle where all the people of Israel had to come to partake in sacrifice and this is where you would Worship the Lord they were not allowed to just do sacrifices wherever they were he said you'll have to do that in the place where I've chosen to make my name dwell which at this time was Shiloh.
Because they had not yet claimed Jerusalem and had not yet built the temple so you had to go to this place to see these priests and they don't know the Lord which means it's very possible as a person to know a lot about the Lord and not know the Lord to be around the things of God but not know God and that's the situation that they are in now it's going to expound basically upon their worthlessness help you understand what that means.
Verse 13 the custom of the priests with the people the custom here being this is what they practice not what they were taught to practice but what they were currently doing how they interacted with the people the custom of the priests with the people was that when any man offered sacrifice the priest servant would come while the meat was boiling so he would come while the meat was boiling with a three-pronged fork in his hand he would thrust it into the pan or Kettle or cauldron or pot which I love how that's written cover you can cook it however you want they were going to do this that's basically what it's saying into the pan.
The or Kettle or cauldron or pot all that the fork brought up the priest would take for himself this is what they did at Shiloh to all the Israelites who came there okay so if you're reading this we just told they were worthless we're told they do this thing and then we're told this is what they were doing to the people at Shiloh now I don't think many of us were like what you like is it supposed to be a four-pronged fork like I don't know what are the what are the rules here.
Well in Leviticus chapter 2 chapter 7 and all over the place but those are two specific places Leviticus 23 731 through 36 there are specific portions that the priests are supposed to eat they were only allowed to have certain sections of the sacrifice so what would happen is all the people would come to to perform a sacrifice there were portions that belonged to the Lord and it depended on the type of sacrifice there were peace offerings and wave offerings and burnt offerings and sacrificial off offerings and offerings.
For sin and offerings for Fellowship there were all kinds of different offerings and this is all laid out in Leviticus uh mostly is the place where that most of that is laid out it's in other places as well but they had portions that belonged to the Lord they had portions that belonged to the priests and then the person there were portions that belong to nobody they'd burn up or take out and throw away and then the the people who brought the sacrifice would eat the other portions and in some ways they were partaking in depending on the type of sacrifice they were partaking in sharing a meal with the.
Lord and so what we're just told is the priests were taking portions that did not belong to them they were supposed to have the right thigh and the breast of whatever the animal was but they're showing up and just skewering and potentially getting better parts of meat they don't want to eat the same thing all the time they're just going to come by and get some things that's the first thing that they're doing verse 15 moreover before the fat was burned the priest servant would come and say to the man who was sacrificing give meat.
For the priest to roast for he will not accept boiled meat from you but only raw and if the man said to him let them burn the fat first and then take as much as you wish he would say no you must give it now and if not I will take it by force okay again we need a little context to see why I mean other than threatening to beat people up why this is bad Leviticus 3:5 and then well I'm sorry Leviticus 3 uh parts of two and three.
And then we'll look at verse 16 and 17 I just want you to see this Aaron's sons the priests that's that's Eli Hoff Phineas shall throw the blood against the sides of the Altar and from the sacrifice of the PE peace offering as a food offering to the Lord he shall offer the fat F covering the entrails and all the fat that is on the entrails then it goes on and talks a lot about fat and different parts of the the body that had fat on them that were belonging to the.
Lord and says and the priest shall burn them on the altar as a food offering with a pleasing Aroma all fat is the Lord's it shall be a statute forever throughout your Generations in all your Dwelling Places that you eat neither fat nor blood so the priests were coming by saying give us raw meat don't cook it first and the person who was there knew more or was trying to follow more than the priests were because they would say Let Me Burn the fat off.
Then he can have whatever he wants and then they would respond do you want to fight a priest today this system is wicked they are not following the Lord verse 17 thus the sin of the young men was very great in the sight of the Lord for the men treated the offering of the Lord with contempt Verse 18 Samuel was ministering before the Lord a boy clothed with the linen ephod which is a a little linen priest outfit you know how cute little kids are.
When you put like a suit on them or whatever that's that's Samuel he's running around in his little little ephan and his mother used to make for him a little robe and take it to him each year when she went up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice which is such a sweet kind of sad part of the story she sees him once a year she comes up she's been sewing him in ephod she's making him closeth she's guessing how big she's how big he's getting.
But she takes seriously the the blessing that he was when she prayed for him and she take seriously her desire for him to know the Lord and I would just say that as parents care about your children knowing the Lord care about him serving the lord I realized at one point when I would go pick up my kids from Kid City I would say did you have fun which something I want I want them to have fun in Kid City but I realized that week after week as I was asking that question do you have fun do you have fun I was helping them frame up what the point of kid city was.
So I've started asking what' you learn about Jesus today what you learn about the Lord because that's actually what I want for them truth is if kid city was only fun and they didn't learn about Jesus we would have failed miserably so we wanted to be mostly Jesus and some fun all right but we want them to know the Lord and that's what she cares about she's blessing him and bringing this ephod each year then Eli would bless ELCA and his wife and say may the.
Lord give you children by this woman for the petition she asked of the Lord so then they would return to their home indeed the Lord visited Hannah and she conceived and bore three sons and two daughters and the boy Samuel grew in the presence of the Lord okay she is blessed she does have more children and something else that happens in this story is time just passed by she's had five children now so Samuel has gotten bigger and older and hoffi and Phineas have dragged out the amount of time they're doing this nonsense that's what just happened we just had a little Montage like a little you know the seasons went by it was a.
Little fast forward and then suddenly Samuel's taller that's what happened here now Eli is verse 22 now Eli was very old and he kept hearing all that his sons were doing to all Israel and how they lay with the women who were serving at the entrance of the tent of meeting so now we find out something else that they're doing using their position to either extort exploit or just to entice no matter what this is wickedness not to be done and he said to them why do you do such things.
For I hear of your evil dealings with all these people from all these people know my my sons it is no good report that I hear the people of the Lord spreading abroad if someone sins against a man God will mediate for him but if someone sins against the Lord who can intercede for him so he corrects them but they would not listen to the voice of their father for it was the will of the Lord to put them to death that.
God is passing sentence and judgment on them you can almost feel them sneer and scoff at the correction now the boy Samuel continued to grow both in stature and in favor with the Lord and also with man I I love how this story is written we've zoomed in this conversation where Eli is correcting his sons he's correcting the priests and he just says they disregarded and then it's like we pass out of the the place where they're having this conversation.
Look look Samuel's taller look at him doing a good job that's basically what the text says he's grown in stature and in favor with the Lord and also with man and I want to say this we we have uh kid city fourth and fifth graders most of the time they go they have their own they're in here with us when we sing and then they go have their own um class that they're a part of and then once a month they're in the room and and you're in the room.
Today do you see see that God's eye was on the growth and development of a child do you see that Samuel was growing in favor with the Lord and with men what you do matters what your heart is doing matters how your acting matters that you develop and grow you can you are not too little to serve the Lord you are not too little to bless people you are not too little to partake in the things of God it's an encouraging part of this text.
Verse 27 and there came a man of God to Eli and said to him thus says the Lord did I indeed reveal myself to the house of your father when they were in Egypt and subject to the house of Pharaoh did I choose him out of all the tribes of Israel to be my priest to go up to my altar to burn incense to wear an ephod before me I gave to the house of your father all my offerings by fire from the people of Israel a man of.
God just appears and corrects the high priest and this is one of the things that's been true for the people of God as God has dealt with Humanity since the very beginning and something that is still true and we need to be aware of the word of God has a authority over the people of God the people of God do not have authority over the word of God that he shows up and speaks the word of the Lord specifically to the high priest just corrects him says here's what the.
Lord says it's like it almost feel like he walks in goes where's the high priest Eli says I'm a high priest he says sit down the Lord has something to say there is no council no Creed no Church history no no power no position no anything that has authority over the word of God the word of God has authority over the Church and we are to be people who love the word study the word know the word and follow the word there's just this glimpse of that in this moment.
But what he says what he starts off with what he's speaking on behalf of God is didn't didn't I Choose You and he's talking to Eli who's a son he's a levite and a son of Aaron he says didn't I choose you when you were still in Egypt meaning that God had chosen for the levitical priesthood and specifically the line of Aaron to be the high priest to do this role and the way the Bible talks about it is that they were chosen special and it was a blessing to them.
When they come into the land they don't the Levites don't get a um a portion of the land it says over and over again the Levites don't have an inheritance because the Lord is their inheritance he says didn't I choose CH you to walk up the steps of my altar didn't I choose you to stand before me didn't I choose you to share my table like you were invited in that's where he starts verse 29 why then do you scorn my sacrifices and my offerings that I commanded.
For my dwelling and honor your sons Above Me by fattening yourselves on the choicest parts of every offering of My People Israel therefore the Lord the God of Israel declares I promised that your house and the house of your father should go in and out before me forever but now the Lord declares far be it from me for those who honor me I will honor and those who despise me shall be lightly esteemed behold the days are coming when I will cut off your strength and the strength of your father's house.
So that there will be there will not be an old man in your house then in distress you will look with envious ey on all the prosperity that shall be bestowed on Israel and there shall not be an old man in your house forever the only one of you whom I shall not cut off from my altar shall be spared to weep his eyes out and to grieve his heart and all the descendants of your house shall die by the sword of men and this that shall come upon your two sons Hof and Phineas shall be the sign to you both of them shall die on the same day and I will raise up.
For myself a faithful priest who shall do according to what is in my heart and in my mind and I will build him a sure house and he shall go in and out before my anointed forever and everyone who is left in your house shall come to implore him for a piece of silver or a loaf of bread and shall say please put me in one of the priest's places that I may eat a morsel of bread judgment has been passed on the line of Eli he says we the line was going to run through you.
But not anymore more we're actually told in Second Kings I'm sorry First Kings chapter 2 27 it says so Solomon expelled abiathar so this is later this is when Solomon's King abar from being Priests of the Lord thus fulfilling the word of the Lord that he had spoken concerning the house of Eli in Shiloh eventually Eli's house is no longer the priesthood it moves to to Z zadok who is still a levite still of the line of Aaron and just not Eli's line they had been placed in a position of service and a position of belonging to the.
Lord but they didn't know the Lord and they used it for their own personal gain and he says your whole line is going to be dead or weeping and begging for bread because of how you've handled this now I want to make that's that's the story that's the section of text we're reading today I want to make four observations from this story the first one is I think we should see the wicked abuse of power that hofi and Phineas did I honestly think that's one of the things that would stand out most to us as we read this text that they were granted a position that was meant to be a blessing that was meant.
To be service and they used the position for their own gain for their own glory for their own good the God speaking through the man of God says you have fattened yourselves and I can't read this without giving serious consideration first and foremost to the role of pastors I couldn't read this this week without thinking about the position the office of elder or Pastor in a Church you see they had to have priests and you had to interact with these priests.
If you were going to go offer sacrifices you had to interact you had to go to Shiloh you had to interact with these priests and so this was happening you were you were stuck in the situation and Christians are supposed to belong to a Church and supposed to have pastors it's one of the roles that meant to exist in your life if you belong to the Lord now you can move around and go find a different pastor but you're meant to have one they couldn't change this up they had to the.
Lord had to work and intercede but we live in a culture right now where we're seeing consistently Pastor abusing their role doing some of this same stuff and it's wicked it's disheartening and there there needs to be those who would go into the pastorate to serve and to love and to take seriously the call of God and know the Lord but you can read story after Story right now people who have mishandled it chosen sin walked in hiding or who have used it.
For their own personal gain and glory and there is some fearful comfort in this story that God sees God knows and God responds and certainly this is one of the reasons why things were such a mess in Israel that those who were supposed to be leading them towards the Lord were not I'm certain it created a lot of cynicism and Brokenness and we can see that culturally as well where there's a lot of people who have Church hurt but I'm thankful that the.
Lord responds but we do need to take seriously the roles and positions of trust that we have I would think the next step of trying to look at that and understanding the abuse of power would be for for anyone who's in a position of trust a teacher a doctor a babysitter a manager at your job that you would take very seriously that you use your authority to serve and to love and to care for people rather than to just benefit yourself I think we need to.
See that from the text I think we need to see the abuse of power but I also think we need to acknowledge wrap our mind around that that is not the primary thing that God addresses when he shows up he doesn't really talk about that it seems as if that's more of a symptom of the problem but the main thing is something bigger and deeper and something that I think that we would largely ignore that there's actually a foundation of their sin or there's an aspect of sin that's underneath why they're doing these things that he comes at here's what it says in.
Verse 17 thus the sin of the young young men was very great in the sight of the Lord for he's going to tell us why the men treated the offering of the Lord with contempt it doesn't say for they bullied the people of Israel which they did but that's not the main problem 29 when the man of God speaking he says why then do you scorn that's to treat with contempt my sacrifices and my offerings that I commanded for my dwelling and honor your sons Above Me by fattening yourselves on the choicest parts of every offering of My People Israel.
So there's this contempt and honor scale that he's addressing the next verse he says Those Who despise me the main issue here is that they are dishonoring the Lord now we don't live in an honor culture we actually live in a very dishonoring culture we just do and there's some parts of that that I think are okay and appreciate or whatever but we don't hold many things sacred as a as a people there's not much that's taboo there not much that's off limits there's not many things that we would plug our ears about and refuse to.
Listen to because it's sacred and to be defended so we're not set up well to understand why this is the bigger issue there are a few places I was I was I was digging around trying to figure out where where are there a few places culturally where we might just go okay hold on stop I think there are some places in South Carolina if you were traveling and you had to stop you were taking back roads to get to the beach or something and you had to stop and get some gas and there was five or six people sitting out in front of the gas station you were walking into the gas station they had.
A brick wall here and they had painted a mural on it let's say on that mural mural there was an American flag or let's say on that mural there was a painting of Martin Luther King Jr and let's say the moment that you saw it you and spit on it I think in certain places in South Carolina the rest of your day would go poorly and it's not that you spit on the wall because if you did that to any brick wall people might think you're gross.
But I don't think they would be up in arms it's that the wall represents more it has something more to it there's something there that's represented that's bigger than the wall there's something there that's sacred you see I think so often when we consider what what's right and wrong what's good and bad and we talked about this some when we did our Series in Exodus and looked at the Ten Commandments that the framework we mostly use is fairness and then we use harm does it hurt somebody.
If you can prove to us it hurts somebody Americans will think it's bad for the record it is but I'm just letting you know that that's one of our main ones this is why when they were trying to stop piracy of like DVDs or whatever people downloading stuff the whole ad campaign was it's not a victimless crime they want they needed you to know that you were hurting someone because if they just said stealing is wrong the people downloading the stuff didn't care they had to try to convince you there was harm.
But that those are the ones that we understand understand but if we look through something and we go I don't think it's hurting anybody and I don't really understand why this would be a rule in the first place it can't be that bad none of us even after we found out the rule I don't think we're scandalized by them eating fat we were just like well okay he said not to this is very clear to me with with having children there are times where we give instructions to our children and the actual thing doesn't matter a lot.
For example if I say you have to clean this up before you go play the actual thing doesn't matter a lot that's a different rule than don't stab your brother that one the actual action matters a lot but if I come into the room and they're playing and they haven't cleaned up the bigger issue is dishonor that's the problem disregard lack of respect contempt and culturally we go yeah but that's not that bad so there's a there's an issue here where.
God gives instructions and if we don't really understand it or if we don't really really agree or if he hadn't done enough to convince me or if I don't really see who it hurts we'll say things to ourselves like well it's really not that bad and what we need to understand we're saying is he's really not that glorious he's really not that big he's really not that good he really doesn't matter that much that's a big problem to dishonor hold with in contempt belittle the.
Lord and the things of the Lord matters immensely and one of the things that we need to realize is that that means there's a current of contempt that runs underneath our sin that it doesn't matter what the action is it can still have this current of contempt that runs underneath it I I walked in on my youngest son at one point in his room and he immediately stopped doing what he was doing and looked at me well what you doing buddy.
And then he said I'm sorry and he told me what he was doing and I was like why are you sorry for that he said you told me not to and I had not told him not to do that thing I don't know what he had gotten confused that was not a rule that anyone had ever given him but I immediately was like you're still in trouble though because in his heart he's rebelling against me so I had to have a whole discussion with him about you broke a non rule.
But you broke a bigger one and there's a reality to our sin that has this current of contempt dishonor and disrespect that runs underneath it and so that when we would let ourselves off the hook cuz we would go well this is just in the privacy of my own home This only affects me this doesn't really bother anybody I don't understand I see it somebody in your group talks to you about it you go I see it's written there but I don't.
But I don't see it I'm going to need him to do a little more work to convince me and the problem isn't that his rules are wrong is that we just don't think he's all that glorious and all that honorable and all that big and that's what the problem in this text was that's why he shows up and doesn't say you did this you did this you did this he shows up and says you've held me in contempt and we need to be mindful to not just.
Look at the sin but to look at the sin underneath the sin and consider what's my heart doing here and do I hold him as glorious and big is he weighty which leads us to the next observation I think we should make which logically flows and again might strike like us is is odd did you notice who the the man of God spoke to is Eli not Hoff and Phineas he mentions them he doesn't speak to them and he says to Eli why.
Then do you scorn my sacrifices and my offerings that I commanded for my dwelling and honor your sons above me see Eli's the high priest Eli's their father by the nature of his position by the nature of his relationship he should have addressed this differently because if you're reading the story you go wait wa wait Eli didn't agree he corrected them he told them they were wrong hold on hold on hold on you're fussing at the wrong guy Eli knew it was wrong he said it was wrong yeah.
But he let it keep going I'll give you an example to help you picture it let's say I'm in high school let's say I invite a friend over to my house let's say he starts being disrespectful to my mother for the sake of this hypothetical situation we will say my dad is not there so the story can continue let's say I correct him I say no don't talk about that in the house don't say that in front of her hey watch your mouth whatever let's say he continues at some point I'm going to choose who has more weight and who gets more honor at some point I'm going to choose who the room tilts towards.
And if I want to keep the friendship if I want the person to think I'm cool if I want this relationship to work then it'll shift towards my friend and will dishonor my mom and God speaks to Eli and he says you let the room shift to your sons and you joined in the dishonoring there is a type of holy protection that we are meant to have where we say no the Lord will be honored as long as I'm present and we're around we will hold that the.
Lord is Honorable and I'm not going to listen to this I'm not going to partake in this this matters with the things that we watch and listen to the jokes that we tell or that we listen to the shows that we watch where we say well it's not that big a deal the people that we hang out and we go well that's not that big a deal this is one of the things that's happening in Church discipline is that we're trying to pursue someone and call them to repentance.
But one of the things that happens at the end of Church discipline is we collectively as a Church say we're going to hold to the Holiness of God the room will not tilt towards you we have to stand as if he is glorious we cannot continue so he shows up to Eli and he says you let them have more weight you gave them more honor this matters immensely this is how Jesus teaches his disciples to pray Our Father in Heaven may your name be honored as holy may we live like you're the most glorious like you're the most wonderful May our hearts be in tune with you may we follow you like we trust you.
Like we love you like you're good even when we don't understand even when we don't know why the rules will rule even in the midst of things that we would desire and our desires are contrary may we walk with you fourth final observation Christ is the solution to the problem of these Wicked priests Jesus is the solution to the problem of these Wicked priests I love verse 35 in the middle of pronouncing judgment he says this and I will raise up.
For myself a faithful priest who shall do according to what is in my heart and in my mind and I will build him a sure house and he shall go in and out before my anointed forever I will get a priest who does what's in my heart and in my my mind there is a glorious gracious Sovereign willfulness of God a loving stubbornness when we think of willfulness so often we think of it in negative context my mom my entire life would periodically.
Look at me and go you're the kid I had to read the strong willed child about she'd be in the middle of saying something about one of my brothers you know the real criminals here and she'd be like yeah they did that and then she'd stop and go but you're the one I had to read a book about and it's like I'm not even like that anymore you guys I'm so easy to get along with delightful we think of willfulness so often in the negative context.
But there's a beautiful glorious wonderful willfulness of God that he looks in the middle of this broken mess and says I will fix it I'm going to have what I want and what he wants is a priest who loves and serves what's in his heart and was in his mind and in his heart is a priest that's going to sacrifice himself so that he might rescue a people for himself what's in his mind and in his heart is that God himself would join us to make a way.
For us in the cross oh don't we want a God who looks in the middle of our mess and says I will have it work out glorious and for the good of the people who would come to me it's wonderful we're told in the New Testament see it should shifts to zadok but zadok doesn't fulfill This Promise he's not still going in and out before the Lord he doesn't do it forever Jesus does we're told in Hebrews repeatedly that Jesus is our high priest that he's the one who stands the priest was meant to represent the people to.
God and God to the people and they're bad at it consistently but Jesus isn't Jesus actually answers the question that Eli asks Eli says verse 25 if someone sins against a man God will mediate for him but if someone sins against the Lord who can intercede for him he looks at his sons and says y'all are the priests y'all are supposed to help intercede but you're actively directly sinning against God what do you think where's your hope what's going to happen and our hope is that there's a great high priest who is fully man and fully.
God so that he could represent God to us and us to God and that he could take our place as first Timothy says for there is one God and there is one mediator between God and Men the man Christ Jesus so that as we look into our souls and we see a current of contempt running underneath all of our sins sin we can go to the Lord and we can say praise be to Christ that you sent a priest praise be to you.
Father that you sent a priest that I have hope that I have a mediator that will atone for my sin that has been directed at you in a Heart full of contempt every time I've disregarded you every time I've Dishonored you every time I've acted as if you did not matter praise be may Jesus cover my sin and forgive me and give me hope and he says he's going to have a high priest that stands before him forever and that's our hope the band's going to come back up we're going to sing together and celebrate together that we have a high priest I would encourage you to consider your sin I would encourage you to.
Ask what is underneath it why do I think it's okay why do I keep coming back to it what does I really want from it what does really believe about it I would encourage you to ask am I living in such a way that I act as if God is small or easily Dishonored easily disrespected and I would ask you to take a moment if you've never trusted in Christ to say Lord I need forgiveness I need someone to stand in between me and you.
And if you've trusted in Jesus take a moment to say Thank You Lord that I do not stand before you without imediator and then let's take some time to praise Christ for his love and the Lord for his willful gracious Sovereign willfulness his stubbornness to redeem a people for himself let's s.
1 Samuel 2:1-10
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
My name is Spencer I am one of the pastors here we are in the book of First Samuel right now we're in Chapter 2 so you can go ahead and turn there in your blue Bibles also will be on the screen we're going to be in verses 1 through 10 as we continue to walk through this uh uh 1 and 2 Samuel throughout this year so I don't know what you were doing uh last Sunday uh but I was having a lot lot of fun uh I was watching the Super Bowl a game that people said was kind of boring.
Because it's a very one-sided Affair but I had a very I guess you could call it delightful experience and watching Kansas City just get murdered it was it was very it was very exciting for me see I'm a Colts fan uh and uh we're in the same conference refences them and for the last I don't know eight years and really the next decade like we're not going to make the Super Bowl because that team well we're not going to make the Super Bowl.
For a lot of reasons but outside of just being a bad franchise right now we don't really have much of a shot uh at making it past Kansas City and I've had to watch these games where they kick our teeth in and kick other people's teeth in and then once like the game like you know goes to commercials I have to keep seeing their faces endless amounts of commercials and they just are really good they have the best quarterback they have one of the greatest coaches of all time and they've gotten a big head the last few years I go watch uh clips of their after the.
Second Super Bowl in a row whenn they had a year ago and just coming out of it just like we're going to three repeat like just real you know and that's not unique to Kansas City it's not unique to their fan base not unique to their team teams that get really really good do this they just they get a big head they think very much of themselves and when they fall there it wasn't just me like I there's a universal response of like yes.
Now part of that you can say is pettiness and I won't concede that an aspect of that is pettiness but I might argue that part of that is Holiness th this is the one of the themes that runs throughout the Scriptures like this is what our God does he humbles the proud he gives grace to the humble so I would say that it wasn't all bad to see this and the way that I wanted to see it uh the proud are eventually humbled that is inevitable you cannot read the Scriptures without seeing this over and over and over again that those who put both hope in themselves.
And then make much of themselves God eventually brings low and what we're going to see today in 10 verses it was the Scripture reading that we had earlier it is both a prayer and it is a song that celebrates that God indeed does humble the proud but he also does raise up the lowly as James chapter 4 in 1 Peter 5 teach that God opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble it's not just a new testament teaching it is deeply rooted also in the Old Testament as.
Well so we're going to see the C ation of God both humbling the proud and raising up the lowly and we're going to see how that's celebrated and how that also ties into the bigger story of the Scriptures with this theme that runs throughout the Bible so my hope is that as we sit in this that we would both be worshiping God for who he is but also it would serve as a warning to our souls and also be held out as a wonderful hope.
So let we pray for us and then we want through this together heavenly father I pray that you might help us sit under your word this morning that where we have doubts where we have arrogance that the parts of our lives that need to be brought in submission to you by obedience to you by faith in you that you might do that this morning that you might put our defenses down for the next few minutes to help us see clearly your heart and that we would not leave unchanged we ask this in.
Jesus name amen all right so uh we introduced the book of First and 2 Samuel and if you are here I'll just quickly highlight what we were doing last week uh this book was all meant to be read together so uh the way this used to be was all one 1 and second samel were all one big story together over time they had to separate into two because of the different Scrolls that they had and the limitations so it's all meant to be read together and one of the things that we saw last week is that uh 1 and 2 Samuel is this big buildup to the establishment of the Throne of David and that's.
Where this is going we're going to see some of these Old Testament stories of David and the establishment of his Rule and his Reign that goes on forever so we're going to get there but we have some stories ahead of us before we get there first is uh the first major person in 1 and 2 Samuel is who the book is named after Samuel he's the prophet the last judge in the period of the judges and he establishes the Throne of David anoints David as king.
But we got to see his origin story which began with his mother and what we saw last week is Hannah uh that she was one of two wives of ela uh the other wife was panana this wife was a uh really a rival wife panana had lots of children and Hannah had none and we saw that panana provoked her grievously that she uh really tortured her with this that we looked at the pain of infertility but also the cultural stigma that was attached to infertility at the time that panana was was constantly uh uh poking at pouring salt into this painful wound.
And then we saw how Hannah uh humbled herself before the Lord in deep longing prayer and then God answers her prayer and gives her Samuel and what happens going into chapter two is this uh this prayer and this song that celebrates this so it says in verse one and Hannah prayed this and and this is a prayer but when you look at the original language in the Hebrew it's very clear there's also really lyrical elements here that are similar to much of what we.
See in the Book of Psalms so this is not just a prayer but it's also a song so that's what we're looking at this morning and it's and it's actually a song of Thanksgiving this is often called the song of Hannah specifically it's a it's a song of Thanksgiving of praise to God for what he has done so and Hannah prayed and said my heart exalts in the Lord my horn is exalted in the Lord my mouth derides my enemies because I rejoice in your salvation all right.
So in that first verse what we see is that there are really autobiographical elements that she's telling her own personal story in this which that that happens we see it here we see it in the Book of Psalms see it in songs that are written today some of the songs that Matt and I have written for m city music there there's autobiographical elements that show up in shades of those songs this is a very common thing that happens in songwriting and she's talking about her experience with this my my my I uh she's recounting this testimony and she says my heart exalts which means Rejoice she rejoices in the.
Lord she says my horn and that's animal horn and in the Hebrew that is symbolic of strength she says my horn is exalted which is to be raised up to be glorified in the Lord so she says my heart rejoices in the Lord but then she says really my strength is lifted up in the Lord so she's praising God that in the Deep experience of sadness and loss that she carried with her for so many years as show she so deeply longed.
For the blessing of a child that finally God has raised her up and she is rejoicing in him and then she says my mouth derides my enemies because I rejoice in your salvation so her mouth derides or really the literal phrasing here is to to uh open wide against her enemies meaning that she has an answer to her enemies now when I was studying this uh commentaries bent over backwards to say well I mean this is actually this is bigger than just panana this is this this is this is actually enemies in general and I'm not a Hebrew scholar and I haven't spent years studying.
First and 2 Samuel but I do have eyes and in reading the first chapter the main enemy that shows up is the woman who tortured her for years so it is enemies plural so it's certainly more than panana but it's not less than this has to be in her mind thinking about the person who made her life so miserable for so long that that she finally has an answer to this schoolyard bully who provoked her for so long and while the answer I would like to.
See is just a you know just a she she doesn't because she's better than I am she responds by rejoicing in the Lord she says look look at this child how good is God how wonderful is God and she continues that in verse two there is none holy like the Lord for there is none beside you there is no Rock like our God so this is very similar to Moses's song in Exodus 15 when he talks about who is like you oh.
Lord Holiness uh Majestic and Holiness awesome inde Deeds doing wonder who is like our God she has that same theme here who is like our God who's like our God who can be built upon like this this rock this firm foundation and she really stops using personal pronouns at this point so a little bit of she was starting at the beginning this I my me this this personal testimony and now she's looking at everyone else say come on do you see how good our.
God is there is no one like him there's no one holy like him there's no one who could be built upon like him and she's inviting everyone else to worship God because of what he has done to her and what he does to his his people and then she continues in verse three talk no more so very proudly let no arrogance come from your mouth for the Lord is a God of knowledge and by him actions are way so she says.
Because there is no one like our God it is time to put the Arrogant speech away talk no more proudly let arrogance not come from your mouth this is what she's getting at because God humbles the proud and he gives grace to the humble and for so long she heard the pride and the arrogance of penum sure the pride and the arrogance of someone who boasted in what God had given to her and she says let no more of this speech happen.
For all of that is weighed against the God who is the God of all knowledge and The God Who will bring judgment upon us his actions are weighed so we get the next five verses example after example of unpacking that idea that God humbles the proud he gives grace to the humble and she's going to hit them back to back to back to back to back to back to back so let's look at these examples that she gives of how God does this verse four the bows of the mighty are broken.
But the feeble bind on strength and this is a picture of the mighty armies that have strength have strength in their archers their bows are Mighty but every single Mighty Army eventually Falls and that proves to be true over and over every strong power eventually Fades and Falls so God humbles the proud but then the feeble by not in strength God will raise up others verse 5 those who were full have hired themselves out for bread but those who were hungry have ceased to hunger.
So it's a picture of those who had full bellies for so long eventually are having to finally work hard to get that again but those who are hungry they will be filled up they will be eventually satisfied and this picture of opposing the the proud and giving grace to the humble continues with her next picture the back end of verse 5 it says the baram has born seven but she who has many children is forlorn and it's a really a shades of her own story that those who have uh who have no children will eventually they will have born seven.
But she who has many children is forlorn that is sad and worn and it's a picture of the reversal of Fortunes here God humbles the proud he gives Grace to The Humble verse six another one the Lord kills and brings to life he brings down to shol and raises up God gives life and he takes it away verse 7 the Lord makes uh poor and makes rich he brings low and he exalts the God gives wealth and he takes it away.
And then we get verse eight he raises up the poor from the dust he lifts the needy from the ash Heep to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of Honor but God raises up the poor and the lowly to a place of royalty this is what our God does and then she gives another explanation of why for The Pillars of the Earth are the Lords and on them he has set the world and that is a picture of.
God securing the foundations of the world that is a poetic picture of how The Sovereign ruler and Creator and ruler and reer over all things sustains creation every aspect of it that's God's providential work that he has determined in every ocean on every Shore just how far every day the tide comes in and he has determined how far it will go out that God has placed the Earth on the exact tilt that it is supposed to be in the exact distance it is supposed to be from the Sun at every.
Second of existence God upholds all of creation which is why we should never ever be prideful never boast in ourselves never boast in the things that we have it be like the kid who is struggling to graduate and he's in this class where he's failing I can say this and identify with this because I did the eighth grade twice but it' be like this kid who is just trying to graduate and the teacher looks upon him and has mercy and says all right I'm going to put you with these two students and he gets paired with the valorium the Salud atorium number one number two in the class and he gets pair with them.
Of course they're going to do the bulk of the work and they're they do such a good job that it's an A and that's presented and then all of a sudden at the end of it all he begins to beat his chest and say look at the work that I've done I'm going to graduate now look at how awesome my work is and it's foolishness and that that's that is in denome what we look like we boast in ourselves and we.
See this so often some some of it's really built into the American ethos of how we think about things that I've earned this that I've built this and that's usually said pitted against others who are asking for help or handouts I've earned this I've built this and the reality is is that you have earned this with the very measure of intellect God granted to you you you've earned this the very measure of how uh skilled you are that was given to you that you were born some will call this the the geographic Lottery you were born in the US and were able to accomplish these things.
Because you weren't born in a place like Lithuania where maybe you were not able to accomplish these things that you got every every break that you ever got was given to you by God the fact that you have air in your lungs and a heartbeat to accomplish the work that God has called you to do was a gift and was given to you so those who boast in themselves and boast in their work really beat their own chest to their own demise and the picture of this is foolishness.
Now there's another bad way to read this another bad way to read this is to look at some of the examples that are given of having strength having children having wealth and think that's the problem in and of itself so you can read this and go yeah Eat the Rich like just really have this that the problem itself is is someone who is in a higher position but that's not the problem that is at hand here it is the posture that the individual has with what they've been given it is the posture of their heart with the prosperity that.
God has bestowed upon them and God brings judgment upon them over and over again you see this throughout the Bible you see Pharaoh and his arrogance and in his pride before the Lord and you see eventually that ends up with him on the bottom of the Red Sea you see later in when Babylon takes Juda Nebuchadnezzar the king who started to pridefully make much of himself and the Lord took his sanity away from him for a period of time you see in the New Testament the book of Acts.
When King Herod when people are praising him like a God and he does not reject their praise well you see that God strikes him dead and immediately God brings judgment he humbles the proud in this life or Worse the next but this is what our God does and he also raises the lowly he raises the lowly either in this life or the next and that theme runs throughout the Scriptures God raises up the Israelites who were slaves for hundreds of years and he raises them up into a mighty nation that conquers that.
God chooses Christ chooses fisherman and a traitorous tax collector and a zealot and a bunch of unimpressive people to build his Church this is what our God does he raises up the lowly and this is what Hannah is singing and celebrating as she also praise in verse n it says he will guard the feet of his faithful ones but the wicked shall be cut off in darkness for not by might shall a man Prevail so no matter how smart or how strong or how rich or how beautiful or how powerful is not by strength that man prevails.
God will guard the feet of his faithful ones but the wicked shall be be cut off in darkness and then in verse 10 it says the adversaries of the Lord shall be broken to Pieces against them he will Thunder in heaven so this reads very similar to other Psalms like Psalm 29 which talks about prideful Kings it says in Psalm 29 he will break them with a rod of iron and dash to them pieces like a Potter's vessel very similar language the adversaries of the.
Lord shall be broken into pieces and against them he will Thunder in heaven then then this is how she ends the song verse the rest of verse 10 the Lord will judge the ends of the Earth he will give strength to his King and exalt the Horn of his anointed he will give strength to his King and exalt the Horn of his anointed that is a very curious ending it's curious because Hannah doesn't have a king and it's pretty unlikely that she's going to live long enough to.
See her son grow old and anoint the first king of Israel so who is she talking about why is she sing and he will give strength to his King and exalt the Horn of his anointed why does she end the song like this so I'm going to argue that it's possible that someone finishes the song for her that someone like Samuel who lived to see the first king of Israel in the establishment of the Kingdom later finished the song it's possible some will argue.
Well actually she knows the Old Testament law and the Old Testament law sometimes gives shades of and foreshadowing of a kingdom that is to come and a king that is to come it's possible here's what I believe I believe the Lord gives us the music that we sing I think he gives the words he tells us what to say and in Hannah's situation I think God gave her the words as a prophetic foreshadowing of the future king of God's anointed king that's what I think is happening here and here's the really cool part.
When you get to the end of 2 Samuel when you get it to the end there's a similar song by David when you get to 2 Samuel chapter 22 you get a song that captures his life that has some similarities in verse two of chapter 22 he says he said the Lord is my rock and my Fortress and my deliverer my God my rock in whom I take refuge my shield and the Horn of my salvation my stronghold and my refuge My Savior you save me from the violence.
Then we get this similar imagery of God as a rock God as a deliverer God is the Horn of my salvation and when you get to the end of his song which is quite a bit longer it's 50 verses not 10 so David really went for it when you get the very end of his song this is how he ends it in verse 51 great salvation he brings to his King and shows steadfast love to his anointed to David and his offspring forever.
So this language of great salvation he brings to his King and shows steadfast love to his anointed is very similar to Hannah's song This anointed king and this Offspring forever now here's the really cool part if you take what God is doing in Hannah's song and you pull that thread towards David and the song that he writes and then you pull that thread even farther about a thousand years we're going to see very similar things that are said and sung by a young woman named Mary in Luke chapter 1.
And when Mary sings a song in Luke chapter 1 after she's been with Elizabeth her cousin John the Baptist is in Elizabeth's womb leaps in the presence of Jesus in her womb after this we see this this song in Luke 1 verse 51-55 he has shown strength with his arm he has scattered the proud and the thoughts of their heart he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their heart God humbles the proud he has brought down the mighty from their Thrones and exalted those of humble estate.
God lifts up the lowly he has filled the Hungry with good things and the rich he has sent away empty he has helped his servant Israel in remembrance of his Mercy as he spoke to our fathers to Abraham and to his offspring forever the anointed king that Hannah for shadows and the anointed one which is another way of saying the Messiah that David also speaks of is the son of Mary Mary the son of David the Son of God this is all pointing forward to Christ.
God has been writing this type of Redemption Song this Redemption of the lowly through different people for a very long time and then that song comes to life Mary gives birth to the Messiah who embodies the very heart of Hannah's song that Jesus The God Who establishes the foundations of the Earth that this God In the Flesh humbles himself by becoming man God humbles himself by becoming man and Philippians 2 says to the point of death he's humbled to the point of death even death on a cross.
And then our humble savior comes for faithful ones now if you misunderstand the song of Hannah and all the foreshadowing that is happening in these songs concerning the Messiah you might wrongfully conclude that Jesus is coming for the good guys the faithful ones here is the good guys the bad guys get judgment but the good guys they get rewarded but that's not what Hannah was singing about and that's not the message that flows through Hannah to Christ now Jesus comes for the lowly and the prideful are brought low and one of the clearest examples we.
See that the ministry of Jesus is that Jesus is preaching quite consistently religious leaders are in the crowd and the religious leaders would have they would have taught 1st Samuel 2:9 in the synagogues he will guard the feet of his faithful ones but the wicked shall be cut off in darkness for not by might shall a man Prevail they would have taught this very message and completely misunderstood who the faithful ones were they would have misunderstood who Jesus is talking about.
Because Jesus came for the lowely he came for the lowly and they and their arrogance and their pride and their disdain of Christ and what he was doing well they all eventually are humbled and the picture of 29 being cut off in the darkness was one that was waiting for them and the very bad ones that the Pharisees had a problem with tenor uh Sinners Tax Collectors prostitutes these are the very people that Jesus came for these are the very people that.
Jesus dined with and they're also the very people that in humility left those lives behind by putting their faith in Christ Jesus came for the lowly now I've heard people that don't believe in God heard people make the argument that Jesus in faith is a crutch for weak people so just a crutch for the simple it's a crutch for the weak and I've also seen Christians try to combat that idea and say and try to fight with it and the way I respond to that accusation is that it's not just a crutch.
For L it is life support for the weakest our faith in Christ is life support for the lowly for those who realize they cannot save oursel we cannot save ourselves it is life support for us and that happens in faith in Christ but it also happens in the very sustaining strength that we get to operate out of all of our days as weak people dependent upon the mercies and the strength of our God if you look at the life of the Theologian John Calvin he got married.
When he was was 30 uh and he was married for 9 years uh he had a sweet relationship with his wife that was filled with a lot of pain and suffering they had four uh infant children that they lost never got to see grown children they uh towards the end of those nine years she got very sick and was sick for a while and she eventually passed away and Calvin in reflecting upon this he says may the Lord Jesus support me under this heavy Affliction which would certainly have overcome me had not he who raises up the prostrate strengthens the weak and refreshes the weary stretch forth his hand from Heaven to me and I.
Just I so appreciate the truth of that for the for the life of a Christian that in all types of circumstances which may never improve in this life that we can be lifted up and strengthened by daily faith in him he strengthens his people when we come to him over and over and over again and again that does not mean that things get better faith in Christ is not mean that you are going to have your situation get better you may never be able to Bear children like Hannah you may always live just above the poverty line things may never get better in this life.
But God gives us daily mercies daily strength until one day when we are eternally exalted so my hope is that as we reflect upon the song of Hannah as we think about this in our in our prayer and meditation this week as we discuss this in our community groups we might see how wonderful it is to worship a God that does humble the proud but through faith brings Grace to those who come humbly to Christ the band's going to come up and we get to celebrate that as we take the Lord's Supper.
Then on the night that that Jesus was betrayed he took bread and he broke it he said this is my body that was broken for you that he took the cup and he said this is the cup of the New Covenant as often as my this is my blood shed for you that as often as you eat and drink this you Proclaim my death until I return and what this meal gets to be for us as Christians is the regular admission that we cannot save ourselves it is the regular confession that we need the daily minute by minute sustaining of our savior that he is our very life support that we need Christ.
So deeply and we come in humility to the table asking God to give us the strength that it takes to make it day by day it is also an opportunity for us as Christians to recognize that we also have shape es of Pride that has Stained all aspects of our soul and it should be a point of reflection for you to come to the table and realize and ask some of the tough questions where are you trusting in yourself and boasting in that trust where are we in Pride and in arrogance denying our every moment need of Christ and the good news of the Gospel is that.
Jesus J dies even for the prideful and the blood that he shed on the cross covers Us in our sin and our Rebellion so you can come into the T come to the table in Repentance worshiping and delighting in Christ if you are not a Christian please do not come to the table the Scriptures make this clear this is a meal for Christians for God's people but there is an invitation for you and that invitation is Christ that is our God saying come in humility come come to me in faith come to me with the admission that you have sinned against the.
God of the universe but he loves you so much that he gave up his life for you that you may not walk in arrogance or Pride anymore but you might humbly find your dependence upon him that is the invitation and my hope is that you would not pass it up but that you would take it let's pray Heavenly Father we pray that you might help us come to you in humility we pray that anyone who is here that has not experienced your Saving Grace that they would right.
Now in humility come to you PL Place their faith in you and you alone and put no hope in works and put no hope in anything they bring they would give their sin and their life to you and you would save them God I pray for us as Christians that you would expose the rot of of of Pride that is so pervasive in our lives and that you would help us in humility come to you you would help us depend upon you.
For daily strength and need until the day we are eternally exalted we ask this in Jesus name amen.
1 Samuel 1
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 are in a new book so we are uh don't be too excited we are out of the Book of Revelation we are in uh 1 and 2 Samuel where we will be for the majority of this year uh so you can go ahead and go there should be on page 129 in your blue Bibles it's in the Old Testament so you can go ahead and flip there now uh Revelation as we talked about uh repeatedly was a genre of Scripture that was apocalyptic.
So you had to interpret and read the book of Revelation in light of its genre and 1 and 2 Samuel uh gets to really a genre of Scripture that is the majority of what you read in the Scriptures and that's narrative uh these are stories and these are Old Testament stories uh now the way that we approach uh Bible stories and Old Testament uh stories and this is just a little bit of the Bible nerdy details that inform how we both teach and approach and interpret these uh stories is from a School of Theology a stream of theology called biblical theology which.
If you're going to Brand a a theology that's the way to go because you can't argue with that like how could you possibly dispute biblical theology it's biblical so uh but that is what it's called and the the approach of biblical theology is looking at uh the stories of the Bible from Genesis all the way to Revelation and to understand them as one larger story so all the individual stories and all the individual teachings are tied into one grand narrative one they'll use the word uh phrase uh meta narrative one grand story of the Gospel of God's Redemption of his people.
So when we approach 1 and 2 Samuel we are looking at it from that approach how does this fit into the Grand Story of God's Redemption of his people now in order to do that well we need to have kind of a quick refresher where we are in the Old Testament uh to understand uh when when first and 2 Samuel show up so if you remember a few years ago we were in The Book of Exodus which is the story of how the Israelites were enslaved.
For 400 plus years and then Moses was raised up to lead them out of Egypt and after the 10 plagues they uh come out of Egypt they start wandering in the wilderness for 40 years and that is when they receive uh the that's when Moses receives from the Lord the rest of the Old Testament law the first five books of the Old Testament so Leviticus Numbers Deuteronomy then Moses dies uh Joshua leads the people into the promised land and they settle the promised land the Book of Joshua is named after Joshua.
Then once they settle into the promised land the 12 tribes of Israel have have landed where they're supposed to where God has given them this this land The Next Period of time is the period of the judges so that's the Book of Judges for 300 to 400ish years is this period of time where the people of God are at times and they seem brief worshiping the Lord like they're supposed to that all all the things they received in the Old Testament law had to live in right relationship with.
God and right relationship with one another that they're doing that well and then things quickly fall apart when they start worshiping the idols of the land and the book of Judges is this is the people doing all types of wild and if you read the Book of Judges it's a lot of rebellion a lot of sin a lot of Brokenness and then God raises up a judge who uh leads the people back who kicks out some of the enemies leads them back to repentance and things go.
Well for a bit and they fall apart and it's this cycle for hundreds of years and the Book of 1 Samuel comes at the very end of the period of Judges so it comes right at the end of that period of time judges 21:25 you see this refrain that shows up throughout the Book of Judges in those days there was no king in Israel everyone did what was right in his own eyes and that is where first Samuel shows up is a period of time where people are consistently doing things wrong doing things their right in their own eyes there is no king in Israel.
So if you're unfamiliar with the book of 1 and 2 Samuel uh you might think this is a book about a God named Samuel or written by a God named Samuel and that would be a good guess uh but that's not the full picture uh first and 2 Samuel uh was at one point all one scroll one one story over time in the way they used to to write and record these stories down the Scrolls were uh it was too big.
For one scroll so it's separated into two separate Scrolls first and second Samuel but it's all meant to be read together as one one uh story that covers not just Samuel but actually one of the main figures that arises in the book of 1 and 2 Samuel is David So largely is about David but not even really David the person what's most important and the main theme of the book of 1 and 2 Samuel is David's rule in reign it is the Throne of David that becomes really the centerpiece of 1 and 2 Samuel 2 Samuel 7:16 says and your house and your kingdom shall be made uh shall be made sure forever before me.
And that is God establishing his Covenant with David that the Throne of David would continue forever which is one of the main points of 1 and 2 Samuel so we're going to see how all of that plays out but we got a lot of stories to get to before we get to that and over the next few months here's what we're going to see we're first going to see the emergence of Samuel who is a a a prophet he's a priest and he is the final judge in the period of the judges.
Then we're going to see the first king of Israel emerge and that is Saul and we're going to see his rise his pretty epic downfall and then we will see the emergence of David and and David his his rise some of the best parts of David some of his failures but the EST establishment of the davidic Covenant the Covenant with David that establishes the Throne of David forever and we're going to look at that but before we get into all of those big themes all these big uh stories that are weaved together we have to get to the origin story of Samuel in chapter 1 and the origin story of Samuel in chapter 1 is.
His mother Hannah so today and next week we're actually G to look at the story of Hannah so let me pray for us and then we'll jump in This Together uh Heavenly Father we we thank you for your word we thank you that week in week out we get to sit under the authority of your word we get to learn about who you are how you save what you are doing and what you call your people to so Lord may we have open ears to hear and receive your word May may you bold us and shape us into your image through faith through repentance and through delighting in you Above All Things We ask this.
In Jesus' name amen all right so let's pick up in chapter 1 verse one there was a certain man of ream zofim of the Hill Country of Ephraim whose name was Ela the son of jeroham the son of eliu the son of toou the son of Zu and ephi he had two wives the name of the one was Hannah and the name of the other panana and panana had children but Hannah had no children so we'll pause there so an ephrathite which is the tribe of Ephraim there's a man named elaa.
Now elaa has two wives Hannah and panana which that should stand out because he has two wives and not one the design of marriage clear from Genesis 2 onward is that a man would have one wife that's how it's supposed to be but when you read the Old Testament you see men step out of that Norm and and usually when that happens almost all the time this happens it goes poorly which I know might seem shocking it's just from Jacob all the way you.
See to Solomon this is not the way it's supposed to be and when they enter into polygamy it does not go well so that is what this man does and this this was more common in the Old Testament because uh men who are wealthier could do this could provide for uh multiple families but that's the first thing that stands out but that's not the main point of emphasis that shows up in these first two verses what stands out uh should be glaring as you read this is that Hannah was childless the Hannah was childless she was struggling with infertility.
Now if you've ever walk with someone who's struggling with infertility it is an incredibly painful thing to witness it is painful to see someone who Longs for the blessing of children um mean the Scriptures speak about children as a blessing from the Lord as a Heritage from the Lord that children are a blessing and to see someone that wants that blessing wants something that is absolutely good want something that is the pattern of of creation and marriage and they cannot have it and they are reminded every single month of the loss of not being able to have this blessing it is painful and and and and it reads.
So clearly that in the Scriptures but it's not just what is so uniquely painful about infertility the layer that we miss sometimes when reading the Old Testament and the New Testament is that uh infertility was emotionally painful but also it was a uh it was it was in their culture a much bigger loss than ours from the sense of your children were your Social Security they didn't have a social social safety net so if you didn't have children you it there's a chance later on that you might be in poverty that's why the Bible's the Bible speaks.
So intensely about caring for widows and this was this was the care for people that that did not have children when they grew old to take care of themselves so this immediately when you read this jumps off the pages oh this is a pain ful scenario verse three now this man used to go up this is elaa used to go up year by year from the city to worship from his City to worship and to sacrifice to the Lord of hosts at Shiloh where the two sons of Eli hni and Phineas were priest of the.
Lord all right so at this point uh the Tabernacle that we learned about in The Book of Exodus this is where God ruled and reigned from this is where people came to worship and the presence of God the Tabernacle is at a place called Shiloh and there the levitical priest who oversees the worship is Eli and he has two sons uh hni and Phineas now we're going to learn more about them in the coming weeks so we'll spend more time on them later.
But this marks the period of time in the judges when Eli is the priest so verse four on the day when elcana sacrificed he would give portions to panana his wife and to all her sons and daughters but but to Hannah he gave a double portion because he loved her though the Lord had closed her womb and her rival used to provoke her grievously to irritate her because the Lord had closed her womb so went on year by year as often as she went up to the house of the.
Lord she used to provoke her therefore Hannah wept and would not eat and elaa her husband said to her Hannah why do You Weep and why do you not eat eat and why is your heart sad am I not more to you than 10 Sons so we'll pause there like polygamous marriages that you see in the Bible Jacob Rachel and Leah his wives there is rivalry amongst these wives which makes sense we are designed for those who are called to marriage to give your love and Devotion to one woman that your sole romantic attention is.
For your husband is for your wife and any woman that gets in the way of that should be opposed that's how it's supposed to be so these women were set up for failure the Rivalry makes sense and panana has the upper hand in this rivalry she has children she has lots of children and Hannah has no children and panana used that as a weapon of war in this rivalry kneeling her attacking her the most painful part of Hannah's reality she's hitting it over and over and over again.
So not only does Hannah not have the sole romantic attention and affection of her husband not only does she not have children her Ral is provoking her it say provoke her grievously who is flaunting her barness and her own prosperity and is attacking her over and over and over again now I've never seen that in real life I've seen that in film I've seen it in television which when it happens and you witness that in film and TV it's like you you were you wanting one of the main characters to be gone it's just it's.
Because it's so evil what a hateful thing to do what a cruel thing to do to someone who is enduring this much pain and loss and again if you've ever seen someone who is reminded regularly that their hopes were not answered their prayer was not answered that the Lord who is Sovereign over the womb who can give us the blessing has not given it it's so painful and to think of someone just pouring salt in that wound over and over and over again is an exponential amount of pain that Hannah is regularly enduring and her husband sees this why that's why back in.
Verse 5 it says but to Hannah he gave a double portion because he loved her though the Lord had closed her womb so when they would go and make sacrifices at Shiloh he would give a double portion of the sacrifice which the Hebrew for this double portion it's hard to interpret but this seemed to be an extra portion that was given it could have been two sheep two sheep heads actually that was given to sacrific to the Lord for from Hannah and that's.
Because he he loves her he sees her in her sadness he sees her in her pain and he sees the robbery that's happening and he tries to console her and he he gives this extra gift and he says Hannah why do You Weep and why do you not eat why is your heart sad am I not more to you than 10 Sons I mean he it's clear he loves her so deeply and when you hear that am I not more to you than 10 Sons.
If you understand this you understand the answer is very clear it's like it's no it's I'm missing something that's so that's so want and our pain is so evident and people listen people have tried to analyze Hannah's pain and her story and tried to see maybe maybe she loved the the the the loved children too much and it's possible that maybe she idolized wanting children too much which certainly could be a factor and undoubtedly that that probably was one that's that's very common with those who struggle with infertility.
But children are a blessing from the Lord and and and this reads as painful because it is evidently painful that infertility hits at some some of the parts of your soul that you didn't even know existed so you can try to analyze her response and her heart and all of that but that the Scriptures are clear in this anytime this kind of infertility shows up it's just painful and it should be understood as such so if you are someone who is struggling with infertility like you you should do the things that are good.
For your soul you should seek Christ in the middle of your suffering you should have people who give you the Gospel you should tell the Gospel to yourself you should have people people that that remind you of your identity in Christ should not walk in this alone you should have people in your life who are walking with you who are praying for you who they AG grieve with you who appoint you to Christ you should do all those things but if you are grieved over this your grief is merited it is understandable and the Scriptures clearly show that to be and in her pain and her desperation we get to.
See a very holy response picking up in verse 9 it says after they had eaten and drunk in Shiloh Hannah Rose now Eli the priest was sitting on the seat beside the doorpost of the Temple of the Lord she was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly so in her sadness she goes to the tent of meeting she goes before the presence of the Lord she's deeply distressed the language of we're going to see in a moment is is anxious deeply vexed clearly sad clearly depressed and she prays she prays into the night she pours her heart out before the.
Lord that in her suffering that in her anxiety that in her sadness she pours out her heart to the Lord when I've walked with people who are suffering for a variety of reason who are struggling with anxiety who are struggling with depression one of the things I want to ask is are are you praying and it's not just to hear yeah I yes no like I I am I want to push further and say well what does that prayer look like.
Because what I've noticed about my own soul and what I've observed it's not unique to our Church but it's widespread in American Western Christianity is that we don't pray quite like this that we don't come before the Lord like this with deep Long prayers and our depression and our anxiety pouring out our heart before the Lord that's what that's what Hannah's doing she's pouring all of her anxieties casting her cares upon the Lord all of her sadness she's pouring it out before the.
Lord verse 11 it says and she vowed a vow and said oh lord of hosts if you will indeed look on the Affliction of your servant and remember me and not forget your servant but will give to your servant a son then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life and no razor shall touch his head so in these deep prayers she makes a vow and the the context of this vow makes it clear that this is a Nazarite vow she's going to dedicate her son in the tradition of number six which is the Nazarite vow this is dedicated service of the.
Lord now if you read number six the Nazarite vows that were taken were usually temporary at some point they they ceased but she has made a Nazarite vow on behalf of this promised this hope this hopeful son for his whole life that he would always serve the Lord and she makes this vou and she's pouring out her heart before the Lord and she's continuing to pray and as she's continuing to pray Eli takes notice verse 12 as she continued praying before the.
Lord Eli observed her mouth Hannah was speaking in her heart only her lips moved and her voice was not heard therefore Eli took her to be a drunken woman and Eli said to her how long will you go on being drunk put your wine away from you but Hannah answered no my Lord I am a woman troubled in spirit I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink but I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord do not regard your servant as a worthless woman.
For all along I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation so out of great anxiety and vexation this deeply troubled distressed Soul she is praying and pouring out her heart so much so that perhaps she has lost the voice to utter prayers out loud and she's praying from the heart as her mouth is just silently praying before the Lord and Eli looks at this and mistakenly says oh this woman has in her drunkenness come before the presence of the.
Lord he is trying to rebuke her for this but Eli is wrong and she says I I'm I I am not a worthless woman I am not numbing my pain with strong drink or wi no I'm pouring out my soul before the Lord and he sees the pain and sees the faith and the fervency of her of her spirit as she's coming before the Lord and again I just want to pause and highlight what an example we have in Hannah what an unbelievably beautiful example of someone who in deep anxiety in deep sadness in the midst of loss and pain pours out her heart before the.
Lord and whatever you might be struggling with that may be so deeply anxious and distressed in your soul or deep sadness whatever you might be struggling with my question is is are we responding like her are we pouring out our heart like this do we do this have we ever done this because that's what we should be doing as the people of God and in our anxieties and in our sadness and distress we we should like this like the example of Hannah pour out our heart before the.
Lord and I know that when I prescribe that as an example that we see from the story that what might be responded is oh well I mean there a p typical Pastor to say and pray about it and just just go pray some more which is typically what's happened in our culture and I think and my hope at least is that you've been here long enough to know that we are not overly simplistic when it comes to anxiety we're not overly simplistic.
When it comes to depression we're not overly simplistic when it comes to issues that are related to mental health but I would want to push us on that I think whol scale I don't I don't think that we have this type of response in the middle of our anxiety have this type of response in the middle of depression have this type of response in the middle of our sufferings and I do think that while it may not certainly fix all all the different facets of your anxiety all the different facets of your depression undoubtedly it will Aid in it that coming before the.
God who sees all of it and pouring out our heart before him absolutely will in some degree or another help and we should do this y'all do not downplay prayer because of the complexities of the mind and the soul and the body see this as a beautiful example to follow as she's pouring out her soul for hours upon hours before the Lord so Eli sees this holy fervor in Hannah and he responds with a blessing verse 17 then Eli answered go in peace and the.
God of Israel Grant your petition that you have made to him and she said let your servant find favor in your eyes then the woman went her way and ate and her face was no longer sad so he gives this Priestly Priestly brother blessing Hannah leaves she eats she's no longer sad verse 19 then they Rose early in the morning and worshiped before the Lord and they went back to their house at Rama and alaa knew his wife and the Lord remembered her and in due time Hannah conceived and bore a son and she called his name Samuel.
For she said I've asked for him from the Lord so this story turns to John that as she pours out her heart the Lord hears opens her womb she conceives and she gives birth to Samuel can you imagine how excited she would have been the first morning she puked her guts from morning sickness was this a one-off did I eat something bad last night and then the next morning it hits again and with a smile as she's wiping puke from her mouth just it's.
Finally happening can you imagine how thankful she would have been with every pound she gained just Overjoyed at the gift that God had given her can you imagine the delightful worship of the Lord as women who known her story for years came and felt her belly and prayed blessings over this child what a beautiful beautiful part of the story so fast forward a few years verse 21 the man Al canana and all of his house went up to offer to the.
Lord the yearly sacrifice and to pay his V but Hannah did not go up for she said to her husband as soon as the child is weaned I will bring him so that he may appear in the Pres presence of the Lord and dwell there forever so she plans to make good on her f verse 23 alcana her husband said to her do what seems best to you wait until you have weaned him only may the Lord establish his word so the woman remained and nursed her son until she weaned him.
And when she had weaned him she took him up with her along with a three-year-old bull an eve of flour and a skin of wine and she brought him to the house of the Lord at shine and the child was young so Hannah woman of Faith makes good on her vow makes good on her promise and when she had weaned him which in their time would have been anywhere from 2 to four years old she delivers him to the service of the temple.
And then leaves so much so that we'll see uh in the coming weeks that she sees him yearly that she's knitting together a len and ephed which is a Priestly garment that he's going to grow out of in a year and she keeps bringing a new one every year because she's seeing him grow once a year verse 25 then they slaughtered the bull and they brought the child to Eli and she said oh my Lord as you live my Lord I am the woman who was standing here in your presence praying to the.
Lord for this child I prayed and the Lord granted me my petition that I made to him therefore I have lent him to the Lord as long as he lives he is Lent to the Lord and He worshiped the Lord there and that ends our first chapter of Samuel so she Parts away with Samuel this future Prophet this future priest and final judge over Israel and it all begins with the faith of Hannah now when I read this story I'm struck by a few different things.
But one of the things that I'm struck by is that after all of those years of pain after all of those years of longing for the blessing of this child that she at 3 years old drops him off and gives up her only son that she just leaves him knowing that she's going to miss out on his childhood knowing she's not going to be the one that raises this child knowing she's going to miss out on so many memories I mean.
When my children entered into kindergarten for the first time my wife my wife was a weepy mess which is almost Universal in dropping off your child for school and we were going to see them hours later and she's dropping off her son to be raised by someone else and every year she's in there in her home praying for her boy knitting together this ly and epid trying to probably guess at how big he's going to be waiting to see I wonder how tall he's gotten this year I wonder how his voice sounds.
Now I wonder what his smile I wonder if his laugh has changed knowing that she's going to miss out on so much when I read it this time around it's just it sticks out so clearly that how could a woman give up her her her promised long waited for only son and when I think about this story in light of the greater story of the Gospel it so clearly demonstrates the character and the Heart of Hanah that reflects the heart of.
God that reflects the heart of a God who loves his people so much that he'd be willing to give up his only son that as the Scripture that is the memory for this month that whosoever Shall Believe in him shall not perish but have everlasting life the love that Hannah has for God and How Deeply she loves the Lord is a reflection of how much God loves the world that he would give up Christ on a cross for our sins so that we could Delight in him.
For eternity it's a beautiful picture of the Gospel now one of the things that is going to be the tension that we feel as we walk through 1 and 2 Samuel is we're going to come across people like Hannah that there's so much that you should want to emulate about her character about her faith about who she is and how she loves God and then we're going to see other people that emerg like Saul that are cautionary tales you're going to.
See that the things you should not do the type of Faith you should not have and then will say people like David where you get a mix of here is a man worth emulating and then you read further on you're like here is a man not worth emulating because you're going to see a mix of both good and bad and here's the tension and this is kind of the this is the behind the scenes of how we should approach this book there are kind of two main ditches on how to understand these stories one ditch is only focusing on the characters the people in these stories and and and looking.
So intently at what they do that you're just creating really moral lessons from their lives and I'll be honest for a long time and still even today that's a lot of the way that that books like this Old Testament stories like this are preached that's a lot of the ways they're interpreted that when you get to David it's instead of looking at what's happening in David and Goliath that we'll read about later on it becom comes more of how can you have courage like David and how could you fight the Giants in your life and moral lessons are the focus of these stories.
But what I have seen is an overreaction to another ditch and this is the ditch that I came up through and it is only seeing these stories through the lens of the greater story of the Gospel and ignoring the people in them and and the character that is displayed and the Foles that are displayed and only seeing it through the lens of the Gospel and I came up with preaching and sat under preaching that looked at this other side and said how dare we David is not the hero of the story.
Jesus is the hero of the story try to moralize these stories as as just slaying your Giants ridiculous and that's where I came up and what I've come to realize is is that wisdom is approaching these stories from the middle path and not falling in the ditches and realizing that yes we should look at these stories for the character that's displayed in them and we should look at Hannah and see the faith that she demonstrates and see how she responds to depression and her anxiety that we should learn from the lessons whether they be good or bad from the people in these stories.
While also realizing that each of these stories are a part of a bigger story that while Hannah demonstrates unbelievable faith and love for God that her Main Place in the story is that God raises her up to give birth to Samuel Samuel the final judge who establishes and is used to anoint and establish the davidic kingdom the Throne of David that will not end and seeing how this all ties together as a whole that when we get to 2 Samuel 7:16.
When God makes his Covenant with David and says and your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me that we can remember that began with the faith of Hannah who gave birth of this son who anoints this man who God looks at and says your throne will never end and we see that all the way to the end of the Bible all the way to what we read last week Revelation chap 22 what you thought we were getting away.
But we're back baby Revelation 22 this is what Chad preached last week I Jesus have sent my angel to testify to you about these things for the churches I am the root and the descendant of David the Bright Morning Star that all the way at the end of the story we see the Throne of David did not end because this was all God's Grand Story and purpose to bring about Christ the Jesus who bled and died for our sins the Jesus who conquered death at the Resurrection The.
Jesus who after the work that he finishes ascends to the right hand of God the Father where he sits on the Eternal Throne of David until he comes back to gather his people and make All Things New in the Kingdom that never ends we're going to seek to tie all of this together and my hope is that we would be wise readers of the text that both will see stories like Hannah that instruct us that correct us that show us what it looks like to be faithful men and women of.
God while remembering God in these stories is bringing about his Redemption the band's going to come up and we're going to worship and My Hope coming out of this is that we would be wise readers of the text that even as you read this on your own that you would seek to be tying these all together and we would be a people that look at our need and the Brokenness the suffering and the sadness and the anxiety and all the things that make this life painful that we would.
See our only hope is Christ and that we would place our faith in him that we would out of that Faith bear fruit of repentance and one of the ways that we can see the the type of repentance that we're called to have is to look deeply in the stories like this and CE oh and may I be a man and may I be a woman who can embody the faith that God gives to Hannah to respond as the Christian that he has called me to be let's pray heavenly.
Father I pray that you might help us as we journey through this book together be instructed be taught about your bigger story of the Gospel God I pray that you might help us see see even today this beautiful example we have in Hannah undoubtedly there are people here that are struggling with infertility that are struggling with things that have brought vacation to their soul and God I pray that you might help them run to you just as Hannah did and for some of that that means Faith.
Lord that there are those that have been trusting in their own Works their own self their own hope for far too long and I pray that you'd help them see right now that the reason they're so deeply tired and vexed and sad is because they do not know you and that they would Place their faith in you and there are Christians here that in their faith are struggling are anxious are weary and tired and as we run to you and Lord may you give us the feet to run to you and the heart to pray to you and to pray long and unceasingly to you that you might meet us and Grant our petitions in.
A way that is for our good and For Your Glory we ask this in Jesus name amen.