1 Samuel 13:15-14:46
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 will grab a Bible and go to First Samuel chapter 13. Um, when my wife and I were going to get married, uh, I remember sitting down with the the pianist who was going to be playing for us.
He was just a guy from our Church and he was he was really good at piano and he was asking questions of like, "All right, so what songs when everybody's sitting down and stuff, what songs do you want me to play? What do you want me to to do?" And I was sitting there, it was me, I think my mom was there, I know my EI was there, my my grandmother. And uh, he just asked questions of like, "What kind of um, what songs you want?" And I started just saying like, well, I just listed off, you know, hymns that I that I appreciated. And I know what you're thinking. You know, I was a 21-year-old uh man.
So, I had thought a lot about my wedding and uh you know, really had planned this sort of thing since I was little. I never done any of this. So, I just was like, I guess I like these songs. And I was listening them off and my my grandmother was squirming a little bit. And then I said, you know, that I like the hymn In the Garden.
And she goes, stop. Just stop. and she said the opening line of that hymn is I come to the garden alone chat you are getting married you are not alone and she just took over from that point she was just like no eras all of that you here are the songs that you need to play and she just started and what she did was and I've had several moments like that in my life where someone just says stop what you want is dumb what you should want is this better thing and I'm reminded of that as we read this text this morning uh that there's a there's something in it as I was studying it that felt like that stop the thing you want is dumb and there's some better thing and what we're looking at in this text is we're in 1st Samuel and really 1st Samuel 13:14 and 15 are kind of a big long story together and it's showing the the downfall of Saul and it's going to continue but this is kind of this big long picture of trying to help us see some of how what Saul did and some of just the events of of the this time in history, but also uh how he messes things up and how it he loses the kingdom. And we saw the beginning of that last week. And we're going to continue in that.
And today we're going to see him paired uh kind of against contrasted against Jonathan, his son, uh as we read through the story. And so what we're going to do is we're going to read through this text all of chapter 14. It's a lot. There's a lot going on. So, we're going to read, we're going to talk, we're going to read, we're going to talk.
We're try to understand what's going on here. And then we're going to as we finish up, we're just going to kind of zoom out and see something that's going on in redemptive history that we see in this text, but that really points us towards a greater hope in Jesus. So that's that's the hope for today is that we would understand this text a little better, that we would uh see what's going on in it, and then collectively as Christians as we look at this text that we would look and see something about Christ uh that that I think um this text helps us appreciate. And so I'm going to pray uh just quickly and ask the Lord for help and then we're going to we're going to go and we got a lot of reading to do.
So everybody buckle up and get ready. Lord, we ask for help. Uh we ask that you would help us to see in your word Christ reflected and the hope of the Gospel displayed in the middle of you working out uh redemptive history in your people. And we ask for your help this morning just that we would we would listen that we would think clearly and that your spirit would minister to us to help us to to come away from sin and to walk closer in faith in a way that honors you in Jesus name. Amen.
All right. Chapter 13 19. It says, "Now there was no blacksmith to be found throughout all the land of Israel. For the Philistines said, lest the Hebrews make themselves swords or spears." So, if you'll remember where we left off, Jonathan had led a successful attack on a garrison at Gibba.
And then the Philistines had marched in. And it says they were as numerous as the sand on the seashore. They had 30,000 chariots. They just march into Israel in force. And then all the people start scattering from Saul.
Saul makes a sacrifice he shouldn't make. He ends up with 600 and he's hiding. And most of the other people are hiding in sistns and tombs and and caves. I mean, they're just scattered as the Philistines have marched in. But what we just read was the Philistines marched their army in, but they had already been exerting an immense amount of influence and control over the people of Israel to the point that the Philistines say, "You can't have blacksmiths." And the Israelites are forced to comply with that.
That the Philistines have so much control over this area that they have outlawed blacksmiths, which is really interesting to me that the Israelites have a king but no blacksmiths. So the Israelites got together like we're have a king now. And they're the Philistines are like neat. We aren't scared of you. Like they just they don't have any sort of real control here.
So it says, it says verse 20, but every one of the Israelites went down to the Philistines to sharpen his plowshare. It's the thing that rides behind an ax, his madic, which is like a pickaxe, his axe or his sickle. And the charge was 2/3 of a shekele for the plow shares and for the maddox, and a third of a shekele for sharpening the axes and for setting the goats. So that's neat. It's cheaper, you know, if you just need your axe sharpened.
It's only going to cost you a third of a shekele, you know, and I'm willing to bet there are some Israelites who are like, I remember when it used to be a fourth of a shekele. Anyway, this is a real thing that happened in history and they've jotted down for us how much it actually costs. Okay. Verse 22. So on the day of the battle, there was neither sword nor spear found in the hand of any of the people with Saul and Jonathan, but Saul and Jonathan his son had them.
So Saul and Jonathan have swords or spears or maybe both, but nobody else does. Everybody else has a sickle, a pickaxe, an axe, or some sort of pruning shear or plow share that they've mangled into something, tied it to a stick, and are going to try to smack somebody in the head with it. Like that. This army does not look good. There's 600 of them, and there's two swords.
It's not it's not going well for them. And that's the situation that they're in. And the garrison of the Philistines was out went out to the pass of Mcmash. So the Philistines had been on the move and now we're told that they're in this area, this pass of Mcmash one day. This verse uh verse one of chapter 14.
one day. So during this whole setup, Jonathan the son of Saul said to the young man who carried his armor, "Come, let us go over to the Philistine garrison on the other side." But he did not tell his father. So Jonathan, his armor bearer, said, "Let's go check out what the Philistines are up to." Saul was staying in the outskirts of Giba in the pomegranate cave at Migran. The people who were with him were about 600 men, including Ahijah, the son of Ahitub, Icabad's brother, son of Phineas, son of Eli, the priest of the Lord, and Shiloh, wearing an ephod. All right, let's see this for a second.
It's already been prophesied to the line of Eli that the priesthood is taken from them. And it's already been prophesied to Saul that the kingship is going to be taken from him. So, we have a rejected king and a rejected priest hiding in a cave. There's 600 soldiers with them, so they probably aren't all in the cave, but they've basically set up camp hiding from the Philistines in in fear and with a very small force, especially compared to the amount of the force that the Philistines have. But one of the things you got to realize is it's not just that Saul's like in a bad spot and rightfully scared.
There's a reality to as the king of Israel and as the people of Israel, they are being disobedient because this is in the law. This is in Deuteronomy chapter 20 says, "When you go out to war against your enemies and see horses and chariots and an army larger than your own, you shall not be afraid of them. For the Lord your God is with you who brought you up out of the land of Egypt." So, it was it was for the king to to have his own copy of the law to keep reading it and to know how he's supposed to handle situations like this. That rest of that chapter in Deuteronomy goes into how to send people home from your army. The priest is supposed to show up and start dismissing people because they don't need them because the Lord their God will fight for them.
That's that's what there's to understand. That's the situation that they to see that they're in, but they they don't. And honestly, I think for us, one of the ways that we can wrap our head around some of how this can apply to us is that as Christians, I think this is how we're supposed to see missionary work. that we actually aren't supposed to stare the odds down and go, "Well, that's a really hard country to get into. Those people really don't want to hear it.
That's really dangerous. That's really violent." I mean, we're supposed to we can notice that stuff, but then we're supposed to move forward in faith that the Lord conquers and can protect and can do what he wants. But in this situation, Saul is hiding. He doesn't have a very big force. And it says this, "And the people did not know that Jonathan had gone.
Within the passes by which Jonathan sought to go over to the Philistine garrison, there was a rocky crag on the one side and a rocky crag on the other side. The name of the one was Bozes and the name of the other Sinn. The one crag rose on the north in front of Mcmash and the other on the south in front of Gibb. So, it's a rocky area and there are basically caverns and jutted out crags that are hanging over and they said there's one this way and one that way and he's trying to work his way through.
Verse six, Jonathan said to the young man who carried his armor. Okay, so he had uh people who had armor have armor bearers. Uh if you're familiar with the idea of like a knight and a squire, it's similar that when you have certain pieces of armor, do you need someone to help you get them off like to tie them on in the back and to put them back on? So they usually had someone who was helping you do some of that if you were more important and had nicer armor. And so Saul has armor, his son has armor, and that's it.
There's not a whole lot of other pieces of armor or military paraphernalia in this entire army. But so Jonathan has someone who helps him get his armor on and off, tie him up, get him ready to go. And it's just interesting to think before a battle that you're like, "Hey, could you lace me up in the back?" But that's what's happening. And so that's who's with him, his armor bearer.
So he says, this is what Jonathan says, "Come, let us go over to the garrison of these uncircumcised. It may be that the Lord will work for us, for nothing can hinder the Lord from saving by many or by few. So, Jonathan gets it. First of all, he calls them the uncircumcised, meaning that he's understanding we're the covenant people of God. We're the people who have the marks of the covenant, the sign of the covenant.
We belong to him. And he says, "These people don't." He says, "So, let's go over there, just me and you, and maybe God will do something because God can do whatever he wants." It doesn't nothing stops him whether we have a lot or a little. And it feels almost like Jonathan might have been saying that to his dad like, "Hey, don't worry about how many people we got. Nothing can stop the Lord." But we we don't know. We just see at his armor bearer and says, "I'm tired of sitting around.
Let's see if God wants to do something." And nothing can stop him so he can work with us if if he wants to. So, let's go over there and see if he'll work through us. And his armor bearer said to him, "Do all that is in your heart. Do as you wish. Behold, I am with you heart and soul." So, one of the very first ride-or- die friends in history, he says, "If you're rolling, I'm rolling.
Do what you want. I'm with you." And y'all, if you We didn't know much about Jonathan or his armor bearer, but now we should all be in love with them. These guys are great. Jonathan says, "We're going to trust the Lord and we're going to go." And his friend says, "Let's roll.
I'm with you." And they're going to go see what the Lord's going to do. And that's what they're doing. And they head out. So Jonathan's going to come up with a plan. It says this, verse eight.
Then Jonathan said,"Behold, we will cross over to the men, and we will show ourselves to them. And if they say to us,"Wait until we come to you, then we'll stand still in our place, and we will not go up to them. But if they say to us, "Come up to us," then we will go up, for the Lord has given them into our hand, and this shall be the sign to us." Okay, Jonathan just makes up a scenario. He's like, "We're going to pop out. Show ourselves." If they're like, "Stay there," then okay.
But if they say, "Come to us," then we'll know God wants us to go kill them and he's handed them over to us. He's walking in faith. This is just a story. I don't think this is meant for you to start living your life coming up with weird scenarios and just being like, "This is how we'll know what God wants us to do." But he we are to see that he just trusts the Lord and he's trusting the Lord can do whatever he wants. And so he's just walking it out in faith.
So it's more of a descriptive story rather than a prescriptive story. We get to walk in the Holy Spirit. It's a little bit different for us. So uh but that's what he does. He just says we're going to do this.
So now let's see what happens. Verse 11. So both of them showed themselves to the garrison of the Philistines. And the Philistines said, "Look, Hebrews are coming out of the holes where they have hidden themselves." So, these are some cocky fellows uh who have been walking around apparently looking for some Hebrews to kill and they've all hidden.
So, they see two guys that Jonathan and his armor bearer pop out and they look at each other go, "Oh, hey, look. They've crawled out of their holes. Neat. And then they say, where we at?" So, they said they've come out of the holes where they've hid themselves.
Verse 12. And the men of the garrison hailed Jonathan and his armor bearer and said, "Come up to us and we will show you a thing." Said, "Hey, come here. We want to show you something." Now, we are not ever going to find out whether they actually wanted to show him something. That may have been a trick, you guys. I don't know.
They might have been cocky enough to think, "We'll just get these two up here." And they were going to show them something like how big their army was or whatever or what it's like to get stabbed. I don't know what they were planning on showing them, but they say, "Come up here. We want to show you something." And Jonathan said to his armor bearer, "Oh, wait. Sorry." Then Jonathan climbed climbed up. Oh, wait.
Nope. Hold on. I can read. Give me a second. I was right.
And Jonathan said to his armor bearer, "Come up after me, for the Lord has given them into the hand of Israel." So he says, "Oh, the Lord's handing them over to Israel." Then Jonathan climbed up on his hands and feet and his armor bearer after him. So he has to scale basically some kind of a cliffside to get up there, which if they know you're coming is one of the worst ways to attack somebody. But the he the Lord's handed him over to him. The Philistines just wait for him to come up. And it says, "And they fell before Jonathan and his armor bearer killed them after him." So Jonathan starts working his way through all the Philistines that he's running into and he's dropping them and then his armor bear is coming behind them and dispatching them.
So they're injured and then no more. That's the way they're working their way through this this group. And that first strike which Jonathan and his armor bearer made killed about 20 men within as it were half a furrow's length in an acre of land. Okay.
So God is handing them over to Jonathan. And we're a little bit messed up because we've watched way too many movies where one person just beats up 20 people. And so we're like just 20. And it's like 20 y'all like this is difficult to do. Fighting one person and winning is hard.
Fighting two people is more than twice as hard. It gets it gets exponentially more difficult. There's 20 and they just are cutting through them. So, you can use movies you've seen to help you picture what it looked like, but you also need to know that this is difficult and that the Lord is handing them over, that this is a display of God's work on their behalf as they're cutting through this first strike.
and it's not a very big place. And suddenly there's a whole bunch of dead Philistines. Verse 15. And there was a panic in the camp, in the field, and among all the people. The garrison and even the raiders trembled.
The earth quaked. And it became a very great panic. So this first strike happens. People start freaking out. They're looking over and they're seeing that they're being attacked and they're watching Philistines die.
And then I'm assuming they're watching the Philistines run. and a panic hits. Then the earthquakes and it goes from a panic to a very great panic. It It's falling apart very quickly. And the panic's in the camp and the field and even among the raiders.
And who who are they? I don't know. But they seem to be highlighted as more scary people who shouldn't have panicked, but they're also panicking that it's just working its way through the camp. And so everyone is freaking out and starting to break apart.
This is what it says. Verse 16. And the watchmen of Saul and Giba of Benjamin looked, and behold, the multitude was dispersing here and there. So, he's got some scouts watching the camp, and they're not on the march.
They're panicking. He's watching as the camp just starts to break up. Then Saul said to the people who were with him, "Count and see who has gone from us." And when they had counted, behold, Jonathan and his armor bearer were not there. So, he says, "Line up formations.
Tell me who's missing." So they line up in formations. He's got different leaders. This wouldn't have taken forever to count. And they find Jonathan and his armor bearer aren't here. So he's trying to figure out what's going on over there.
And who's left? Have people gone to start fighting? What's going on? So Saul said to Ahijah, "Bring the ark of God here, for the ark of God went at that time with the people of Israel." Now while Saul was talking to the priest, the tumbolt in the camp of the Philistines increased more and more. So Saul said to the priest, "Withdraw your hand." Then Saul and all the people who were with him rallied and went into the battle.
Okay, we get a little glimpse of how Saul operates. He's hanging out. He gets the news that this is breaking apart. He says, "Count, see what's going on." He realizes Jonathan and his armor bearer aren't there. Then he yells for the priest, "Bring the ark.
Bring the ark. Bring the ark." While he's getting that all set up and the priest is trying to figure out, they're going to try to see like what does the Lord want us to do? We're going to inquire of God. They're bringing it over here. Let's figure out what's going to happen.
Then it starts happening more and he just yells at the priest, "Stop." So he's like, "Bring the ark." And then he's like, "Quit. We're not doing that." And then he then he takes off. And you can just kind of see that Saul doesn't ever really know what to do. He He's not cool, calm, collected. Him hiding in the baggage when they were calling him to be king is kind of a good picture of what he's like.
He just seems to kind of he's just trying to figure it out as he goes. And he doesn't really ever seem like he's got clarity. And some of it, I think, is that Saul doesn't know who God is. Doesn't know how to trust him. He's not He's anchoring it in himself and he's anchoring it in the people around him and how things are going.
He's always based in his circumstances. And so he's whipped around rather than being able to just kind of see ahead and stay steady. But they go into battle and behold, every Philistine's sword was against his fellow, and there was very great confusion. Okay, so the Lord is at work in this panic.
He's at work in this confusion, and they they don't know they don't know what to do. People are running, people are shouting, they're starting to stab each other, they feel like they're under attack. If if you're in a camp and suddenly it's very obvious because of all the stuff that's going on that you're under attack, but they're there's only two guys that actually are on the other team at this first little bit of moment before the other people start coming. And it seems like they're all just seeing people running, seeing swords moving. Everybody's panicking.
and they're starting to attack each other, which is a picture of how God works because the Israelites don't need swords if they'll just trust the Lord. These guys have swords and they'll stab each other with them. Verse 21. Now the Hebrews who had been with the Philistines before that time and who had gone up with them into the camp, even they also turned to be with the Israelites who were with Saul and Jonathan. So, there are some Hebrews who had basically been captured or conscripted and they were just with the Philistines and all of a sudden when the Philistines start stabbing each other, they're like, "Well, we're not just going to let you stab each other.
We're going to help. You know, we will also stab you." And so, they hop in. Likewise, when all the men of Israel who had hidden themselves in the hill country of Ephereim heard that the Philistines were fleeing, they too followed hard after them in the battle. So the Lord saved Israel that day and the battle passed beyond Beth Aan. So all of a sudden, remember when they were like, "Hey, look, they've come out of their caves." They do that and they also join in fighting the Philistines and the Lord saves them and the battle breaks up.
And now we're going to hear more about how the rest of this day plays out. Verse 24. And the men of Israel had been hardpressed that day. So Saul had laid an oath on the people, saying, "Cursed be the man who eats food until it is evening, and I am avenged on my enemies." So apparently, prior to coming in with his 598 soldiers and one sword, Saul says, "No one's allowed to eat until it's night time, and you'll be cursed." That's how he sends them into battle. So none of the people had tasted food.
Verse 25. Now when all the people came to the forest, behold, there was honey on the ground. And when the people entered the forest, behold, the honey was dropping, but no one put his hand to his mouth, for the people feared the oath. So they've been told, "Nobody's allowed to eat." They're on the march. They've been fighting.
At first, that's fine. You're riding in the battle, whatever. Then it's like, "Okay, this is getting harder and harder." As they're chasing people, they enter into the forest. And y'all, it's like entering Willy Wonka's chocolate factory. Honey was the sweetest thing they had.
It's the sweetest thing they knew. This is they they enter into a magical dream forest where it's flowing with milk and honey. Like, it's actually happening, you guys. The honey's here, and they're not allowed to have it because there's been this curse that's breaking that up, that's messing up this hope that they would have been able to enjoy. They they come in and honey's just dripping.
Maybe the only time in their life they ever saw this and they're like, "I'll be cursed if I eat it." I just want y'all to feel sad with them. This is sad. But Jonathan had not heard his father charge the people with the oath because he was out, you know, trusting the Lord and winning a battle. So he put out the tip of the staff that was in his hand and dipped it in the honeycomb and put it his hand to his mouth and his eyes became bright. Then one of the people said, "Your father strictly charged the people with an oath saying, "Cursed be the man who eats food this day and the people were faint." So they're working.
Jon, they've all caught up with Jonathan now. Jonathan, they're going through, they're fighting. Jonathan sees this. He starts eating some honey and he's like, "This is good." That's his eyes became bright. He was like, you know, like a cartoon like it was nice.
And then one of the guys is like, "Hey, your dad said not to do that." And they're all, you can almost see all these tired guys. It says the people are faint. They're all sitting there like, and they're like, "He he said you'd be cursed if you ate food." And then Jonathan said, "My father has troubled the land. See how my eyes have become bright because I tasted a little of this honey. How much better if the people had eaten freely today of the spoil of their enemies that they found for now the defeat among the Philistines has not been great.
He just like why why would he say that? Like he's made this harder. We've got to go fight. Why is he making it harder?
If people could have just eaten, we we'd have more strength. We like it. We're all tired. We're not catching them like we ought to. That's basically his response.
We could have done more. My father's troubled the land. Verse 31. They struck down the Philistines that day from Mcmash to Halon. And the people were very faint.
So earlier they were faint. Now they're very faint. The people pounced on the spoil. So it is evening now. That day's ended.
That's why they did this this day to here. And then the people pounced on the spoil and took sheep and oxen and calves and slaughtered them on the ground which is bad. And the people ate them with the blood. That's why it's bad. They were to slaughter the animals in a way that would drain the blood out.
They start just killing them and starting to eat. And they told Saul, "Behold, the people are sinning against the Lord by eating with the blood." And he said, "You have dealt treacherously. Roll a great stone to me here." And Saul said, "Disperse yourselves among the people and say to them, "Let every man bring his ox or his sheep and slaughter them here and eat, and do not sin against the Lord by eating with the blood." So every one of the people brought his ox with him that night and they slaughtered them there. And Saul built an altar to the Lord. And it was the first altar that he had built to the Lord.
So he brings a big stone. They start slaughtering them the way they're supposed to to drain their blood out so they can eat them. And the reason they had pounced on them and started eating was because as soon as the sun dipped down, they all said, "It's time to eat." And they were very, very hungry and very, very faint and they handled it poorly. Verse 36. Then Saul said, "Let us go down after the Philistines by night and plunder them until the morning light.
Let us not leave a man of them." And they said, "Do whatever seems good to you." So they've eaten, rested a little bit, and he says, "Let's go while it's still dark and attack them. We'll plunder them now." But the priest said, "Let us draw near to God here." So he says, "Wait, let's ask God if we should do that." And Saul inquired of God, "Shall I go down after the Philistines? Will you give them into the hand of Israel?" But he did not answer him that day. And Saul said, "Come here all you leaders of the people and know and see how this sin has arisen today." So Saul's inquiring of the Lord. Priest is inquiring of the Lord.
And the Lord's not answering. So he says, "Something's gone wrong. We've sinned. Somebody's broken faith. There's a problem." So he summons all the leaders and says, "Y'all come here.
For as the Lord lives who saves Israel, though it be in Jonathan, my son, he shall surely die." But there was not a man among all the people who answered him. Okay. So he says, "Everybody get here." And then he says, "Even if it's Jonathan, we're going to kill him." Nobody says anything. But I do think there was one guy in the crowd who had a flashback to Jonathan eating honey and was like, but they all just kind of watching to see how this is going to play out. They also ate blood.
So it's a little unclear as to what's going on here. Then he said to all Israel, "You shall be on one side, and I and Jonathan, my son, will be on the other side." The people said to Saul, "Do what seems good to you." Therefore Saul said, "Oh Lord, God of Israel, why have you not answered your servant this day? If this guilt is in me or in Jonathan, my son, oh Lord, God of Israel, give Uram. But if it the guilt is in your people Israel, give Thumbum." And that's the way they would cast lots and the priests would do it. And Jonathan and Saul were taken, but the people escaped.
So they cast a lot, and it falls to Jonathan and Saul. Then Saul said, "Cast a lot between me and my son Jonathan." And Jonathan was taken. Now, I wonder if there was a moment there where the the men of the military who were watching this were hoping that it would land on Saul. He lands on Jonathan. Then Saul said to Jonathan, "Tell me what you have done." And Jonathan told him, "I tasted a little honey with the tip of the staff that was in my hand.
Here I am. I will die." Now, that's a curse that Saul pronounced. God doesn't respond to Saul and the lot falls to Jonathan. Meaning that the curse that God that Saul pronounced as the Lord's anointed and as the king and in the position he's in is effectual. It's real.
It actually applies. So there's a curse that only exists because of Saul and it falls on Jonathan who in this story has been great, who's led the way that Saul should have led, who's accomplished what Saul should have accomplished, but the curse is on him. Now, he did break the nature of the curse, but when you're reading the story, it seems as if that curse should have never existed. Then Saul said to Jonathan, "Tell me what you have done." And Jonathan told him, "I tasted a little honey with the tip of the staff that was in my hand. Here I am.
I will die." And Saul said, "God, do so to me and more also. You shall surely die." Jonathan. Then the people said to Saul, "Shall Jonathan die who has worked this great salvation in Israel? Far from it. As the Lord lives, there shall not be one hair of his head fall to the ground, for he has worked with God this day." So the people ransomed Jonathan so that he did not die.
Then Saul went up from pursuing the Philistines, and the Philistines went to their own place. And what we have in that section of text is the accounting of an interaction that happens and no commentary from the Bible on what should have happened. It seems as if Saul shouldn't have made that curse. And then you really shouldn't keep promises that are to do bad things. But also, there are times where there are curses placed and people should reap the consequences of them.
So, it's one of those things where it's like Saul shouldn't just listen to his men as they say that we shouldn't do something if it's the right thing to do, but he does give in to what they want, which also seems like the right thing to do. And it's this big convoluted mess. And that's kind of what you get when Saul's in charge. That's some of what seems to be playing out in the story is that if Saul's in charge, it he places a curse, but then it lands on Jonathan. But he said even if it's Jonathan, we'll kill him.
And then it lands on Jonathan because Jonathan, you know, gets sideways with the curse. And then he says, "Okay, well, I definitely will and God will do more to me even if I don't." And then all the people say, "No, you won't." And he says, "Okay." And in some ways, the curse that he places on Jonathan, we do see that Jonathan, the kingship doesn't go to him, and he does die. And it seems like there's possible possibility that some of this curse still follows him. I I don't I don't know. the curse seems real enough that the Lord doesn't answer and the lot falls to Jonathan.
And I I do think that there's a there's a glimmer of a reflection of Christ here where he's the one who does everything right and then he goes and absorbs a curse that should have never been there that was caused by someone else. and that at the end rather than all the people ransoming him, he actually does die and ransoms all the people. So there I I do see that that moment set up there where I I I don't think that's really what the text is doing, but I can't help as we read the Bible, we we we are meant to look to Christ to understand Christ as we understand the text. And that's how Jesus reads the Bible. He says that these Scriptures point to him.
But in the big picture of redemptive history here, there's something playing out that I want us to see as we look at verse 47 and and through the end of the chapter. When Saul had taken the kingship over Israel, he fought against all his enemies on every side, against Moab, against the Ammonites, against Edom, against the kings of Zoba, and against the Philistines. Wherever he turned, he routed them. and he did valiantly and struck the Amalachites and delivered Israel out of the hand of those who plundered them. So, the story that's working through here and telling us about Saul takes a moment to pause and give kind of a recap of some of his kingship and some of what he does before it goes into how this place where he does valiantly with the Amalachites, he also really messes it up, which is what we'll look at next week in chapter 15.
But he does fight off Israel's enemies. Verse 49. Now the sons of Saul were Jonathan, Ishvi, and Malashua. And the names of his two daughters were these. The name of the firstborn was Marab and the name of the younger Michael.
And the name of Saul's wife was Ahanoam, the daughter of uh Aimaz. And the name of his the commander of his army was Abner, the son of Nurr, Saul's uncle. Kish, so his cousin was his general. Kish was the father of Saul. Ander, the father of Abnner, was a son of Abio.
There was hard fighting against the Philistines all the days of Saul. And when Saul saw any strong man or any valiant man, he attached him to himself. So Saul, for all his faults, we're given this section here that says he was fighting nonstop and he routed people and he delivered them from those who had plundered them and he fights the Philistines nonstop. And I realized as I'm reading this text and there's so many things going on that one of the things that was happening to me as I read it and as I read the beginning of it where it says that there's no blacksmiths in Israel and the ending where it says he's fighting non-stop is that I honestly what I want is for Saul to just be good at fighting. And it gets the end and it says he's routed them and he's kicked off the people plundering them.
I'm I'm like yeah okay. So he can mess things up, but as long as he's good at that, that seems good. Like I read the beginning of the story and it's like what I want is for Israelite, the Israelites to be so powerful. Like that they all have swords. I want a montage of battles where the Israelites start having more and more gear the whole time.
That's what I That's what I want to see. I want to see by the end of it to be like a really good-look army, shined up, polished. and they're all outfitted and Israel has grown in strength. That's what I'm reading this desiring. And as I was considering that, I was reminded of a prophecy in Isaiah chapter 2.
I want to read it to y'all talking about the future Messiah, talking about the future kingdom of Israel. says, "It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains and shall be lifted up above the hills and all the nations shall flow to it." It's going to be the center of existence. And many people shall come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths. For out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. So saying in the latter days in the future there's going to be a kingdom set up where the king reigns.
The Jerusalem will be the center of existence. Verse four it says he shall judge between the nations and shall decide disputes for many peoples and they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. My grandmother's saying, "Stop. What you want is bad.
There's something better." And I'm reading this and I'm realizing that y'all, that's the story of human history. that God created us and we began in a garden where there was peace and joy and life and fruitfulness and then we rebel and go into sin and death and violence and pain and sorrow enter the world. And all of human history is taking plowshares and trying to turn them into swords. All of human history is taking gardening tools and having to try to arm ourselves with them, which has happened throughout history over and over and over and over again, which has happened in your story over and over again. We still can see the remnants of the garden, the things that are beautiful, the things that are good, the things that are delightful, the ways that God is at work in grace and goodness.
And then we also see all this brokenness, this violence, this hatred, this sin, this despair, this sorrow. And so much of our stories, if you'll think about it, is basically something that was going to be good having to be twisted because of something terrible so that we might defend ourselves. that some of your story is, yeah, this was beautiful, but now this is why I react this way in these situations because this thing happened and it's just how I had to take my gardening tool and turn it into something to fight with. And that throughout human history, we've taken gardening tools for cultivation, for peace, for delight, for enjoyment, and we've had to learn how to fight with them. And where I was setting my sights was, could we just be tough enough that we're capable of fighting well?
And there's a coming king who says, "We're going to do something unheard of in human history. We're going to turn swords into plowshares. We're going to get to go back to the garden." that because of the work of Jesus, he's actually going to undo the brokenness in the world to the point that there gets to be a garden again where nations no longer learn war, where the Naval Academy doesn't exist, where we aren't having to teach our children how to fight and defend themselves. We're not having to outfit all the ladies in our in our society with ways to protect themselves and to defend themselves because of how awful all the situations are. We aren't having to constantly try to figure out what could have been a garden and how do we turn our weap our our tools into weapons so that we can protect ourselves.
We actually get to go back to where he has redeemed. And he does that in our souls too because of the work of Jesus who's working in this redemptive story that the promise of David is coming is going to come to Christ and he's going to show up and he's going to live perfectly and he's going to die so that we might be redeemed and he's going to ransom a people for himself and he's going to work in our souls to straighten out what's broken. And then he's going to do that ultimately so that we have a home and a future and an eternity where we don't need warriors because we have a king who has set everything right. The band's going to come back up and we're going to sing. I want us to sing as people who have a better hope.
I want us to sing as people who have a greater king. I want us to sing as people who have an eternity that is coming where everything is set right. And if you have not trusted Christ, if you have not looked to him to see what only he can do because he is the king who has come that ultimately brings this redemption, I will tell you that if you do, he'll begin to do this in your soul. He'll begin to straighten things back out. And then ultimately, he'll fulfill his promise that there's a kingdom with him at the center where there is no war.
There's just peace and joy and hope. and it's better than anything we could hope for as we try to play this out here. Let's pray. Lord, may we be confident in faith. May we trust in you as sovereign, as good, as holy.
And Lord, in all the places where we've set our sights too low, in all the places where we're willing to accept this brokenness and we don't have a better mental picture of how it could be better, Lord, we ask that your spirit would go to work to help us to see how you can redeem in miraculous ways that undoes the brokenness. And may you give us the faith to trust you to do that in our relationships, in our attitudes. Lord, may we not accept, well, this is just how it is, so this is just how I have to act, or this thing happened to me, so I just have to be like this, like I'm stuck in this spot. May we come to you and say, Lord, you can turn a sword into a plowshare, and will you do that?
And then, Lord, may we look forward to the day when you rule the nations and they learn war no more. And may we sing as a redeemed people longing for that redemption in a way that honors you in Jesus name. Amen.
1 Samuel 13: 1-15
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
I'm one of the pastors here. If you'll grab your Bible and go to First Samuel chapter 13. If you didn't bring a Bible with you, if you don't own a Bible, there should be a blue one stuck down in the seat in front of you. If you don't own one, take this home with you. We want you to have a Bible.
Um, I would take a moment as we begin this morning to remind you why we're here and what we're doing here. If you belong to Jesus, you belong to a way of life. You've been called into a new existence because of the work of Christ and you are following him in faith. When we gather on Sunday, we do some things repetitively, intentionally repetitively because it's through repetition that we develop. It's through repetition that we grow.
Everything you've ever learned, you've learned by doing more than once. And if you do something once and you you learn it, then you have to do it again six months later, a year later, you go, "Ah, I I did do this once, but I don't remember how." Because that's how we learn through practice. So what we've what we're doing when we gather on Sundays is our Church family who is in community groups throughout the week, is walking in life together, who's trying to follow Jesus together, trying to be missionaries together, we're gathering to practice together, studying the Scriptures, singing, praying collectively. This is participatory. It's it's not something that you just do.
This isn't the whole of Christianity where you show up to an event. That's not what this is. that we have gathered as the people of God to do this collectively. And I just want to remind us of that as we go into the word this morning and study it together, that you would remember and be intentional about participating and being actively involved in your own growth as we repetitively try to study the Bible together as people who belong to Jesus and to each other. We told you a couple of weeks ago, Spencer did that Saul was not going to turn out well for him.
And then the following week, I said it won't turn out well for him, but we're not there yet. All right, team. We're there. It It's the beginning of the end. We're going to start things are going to start going poorly for Saul for a long time.
We're going to read a lot of things going poorly for Saul pretty much from here on out. So, if you'll go to chapter 13 verse one, it says this. Saul lived for one year and then became king. And when he had reigned for two years over Israel, Saul chose 3,000 men of Israel. Okay, so in the SV, the way that's worded is a little odd.
And if you have some other version of the Bible, it's quite possible that your version of uh chapter 13 verse1 says something different. Some versions just have dot dot dot. It'll say Saul lived dot dot dot and he was king over Israel dot dot dot. Some of them say he was 30 years old when he became king and he ruled for 42 years. And all of that is an indication that in the original manuscripts that we have, so there was an original version of this and then there are manuscripts that are hand copies.
We don't exactly know what what verse one says. It's the kind of the normal uh setup to explain a king. They would normally say became king at this age and reigned for this amount of time. That the best text we have says that Saul was one year old when he became king. Seems farfetched.
We saw him looking for donkeys and he was the tallest guy in Israel. So, he'd be a really tall one-year-old. Uh it it doesn't say one-year-old. It says he was a year old. And so, it seems like it's possible.
What it's saying is he had reigned for a year and then he did this once he had become two years. He actually was reanointed as king. It's possible that there's just some data missing. Um and there's a lot of people who do a lot of investigation in the text and try to understand when we match manuscripts together. We have a very reliable Scriptures, the most reliable historical document that exists.
But there are a few places that we go we're not exactly sure what was originally written here. And this is one of those. but doesn't change doctrine. Doesn't even really affect this story. Move to verse two.
Uh it says, "Saul chose 3,000 men of Israel. 2,000 were with Saul in Mcmash and the hill country of Bethl. And a thousand were with Jonathan in Gibia of Benjamin." This is the first time we've been introduced to Jonathan. Jonathan is Saul's son. So, there has been some amount of time from the time that he was anointed because we were told he was a young man when he was anointed and now he has a son old enough to lead troops.
Saul also now has a standing army. Samuel told the people of Israel this would happen in chapter 8. They said he's going to take your sons and he's going to make them into a military. And he's doing that. When he called them all together, he had 330,000 fighting men.
Well, now he's down to 3,000 that he's going to keep ready to go. So 1% uh of what he had the first time when he went and fought in Nahash he has with him. It says the rest of the people he sent home, every man to his tent. So he's got a standing army. Verse three, Jonathan defeated the garrison of the Philistines that was at Gea.
And the Philistines heard of it, and Saul blew the trumpet throughout all the land, saying, "Let the Hebrews hear." So Jonathan goes and leads his forces to win a victory at Gibba. Now Gibba was a Levitical city. The Levites weren't given um an aotment of land the way the rest of the tribes were. They were dispersed because they were the priests and they were going to help the people follow the Lord. And this is one of their cities.
And apparently as the Philistines have taken over and are exerting rule over the people of Israel, they have different places where they have more authority. And this is one of them. And Jonathan, who we just got introduced to, next verse, he's winning battles. That's great. But he uh defeats the garrison of the Philistines there.
And the Philistines find out about it. And then Saul announces it to the people of Israel. Let the Hebrews hear. And it says this, "And all Israel heard it said that Saul had defeated the garrison of the Philistines, and also that Israel had become a stench to the Philistines, and the people were called out to join Saul at Gilgal." Okay.
So when Nahash of the Ammonites came and surrounded uh the city, and Saul found out about it, he uh called for all of Israelite, all the Israelites to gather. 330,000 came. So now, uh, he's doing the same thing. He's announcing, "Okay, it's time to go.
We've started something with the Philistines. Y'all show up and let's go." That's what's happening. So they're they're putting out a call for the people together. Verse 5. And the Philistines mustered to fight with Israel 30,000 chariots and 6,000 horsemen and troops like the sand on the seashore in multitude.
Can you imagine getting that scouting report? They had 30,000 chariots. They had 6,000 horses. How many troops?
You ever been to the beach? It's like that. Just scarier. I mean, it is massive. The amount of Philistines that have arrived to fight that have mustered to to come to war.
And it says they came up and encamped at Mcmash. Now, if you're paying attention, that's where Saul had been. He's moved to Gilgal, but they've now come all the way in to where he was had. He had a standing army. They've arrived to exactly where he just was and they have covered the land.
So it says they came up and encamped at Mcmash to the east of Beth Haven. When the men of Israel saw that they were in trouble, for the people were hardpressed. The people hid themselves in caves and in holes and in rocks and in tombs and inistns. And some Hebrews crossed the fords of the Jordan to the land of Gad and Gilead.
Saul was still at Gilgal and all the people followed him trembling. This massive invading force comes and the people scatter and hide. And behold, villages and cities look like ghost towns. People have gone to caves. They've gone to rocks, meaning they've gone to places that are uninhabited and unlikely to have an army march through.
They've gone into sisterns, which are big containers to catch rain water. So, it's unclear to me whether they had rain water in them or these were sistns that weren't functioning or if it was dry at this time. They go to tombs. It's bad. They're terrified.
All of normal life has ceased. And it says those who are with Saul are trembling. It also means that nobody's coming to Saul. The announcement, gather, let's fight.
All people heard was, oh no, the Philistines, and they went and hid. Verse eight, he waited seven days, the time appointed by Samuel. Okay, so we've just jumped into something that we don't have all the details on. The Bible gives us all the details we need. There are a lot of times it doesn't give us all the details we want.
So, whenever you're reading a text, it's giving you the information that you need. It's giving you the information that you should have, but it doesn't necessarily give us all the answers that we want. So, we know that Saul and Samuel have some agreement. Saul's in Gilgal and he's waiting. Now, we know that he's waiting on Samuel and that there's some sort of agreement between the two of them and that Samuel has appointed a time.
Now, in chapter 10, there was a time where Samuel told him, "Go to Gilgal, wait 7 days, I'll be there and we'll we'll do uh burnt offerings and peace offerings." And it seems like it's possible that this was somewhat regular or this is information at least that's happened before. And so, he tells him, "Go to Gilgal." And he's got some instructions. And we're going to find out in a moment that he's going to break the commandment that was given to him that Samuel's going to say it was a commandment from the Lord. So that what Saul is doing is waiting at Gilgal for Samuel on the word of the Lord for what he's supposed to be doing. So here's what happens.
He waited seven days, the time appointed by Samuel. But Samuel did not come to Gilgal, and the people were scattering from him. So Saul said, "Bring the burnt offering here to me and the peace offerings." And he offered the burnt offering. So he was apparently waiting for Samuel to come offer the burnt offering and the peace offerings. Samuel doesn't arrive.
So Saul just says, "Bring it here to me." Now, this situation is terrible. Saul's the king. Everybody's looking to him to lead, you know, because he's the king and it's his job to protect the people of Israel. That's what those worthless fellows that we read about in chapter 10. They said, "How will this man save Israel?" And, you know, we said they had a point because he was hiding when they were trying to come get him.
And they were like, "I don't think this guy can do it." And that's his job, though, to save, to protect. and he now is uh he has 3,000 people that he's gathered to him. There's 30,000 chariots, 6,000 uh horsemen, and countless multitude of soldiers. And it says his people are starting to scatter. So he just says, "Bring the burnt offering to me." And he offered the burnt offering.
As soon as he had finished offering the burnt offering, behold, Samuel came with I mean, sitcom timing. As he offered the burnt offering, as soon as he had finished offering the burnt offering, Samuel came and Saul went out to meet him and greet him. And Samuel said, "What have you done?" which is not what you want a prophet or God to ask you. That's what God asks Adam in the garden. That's what God asks Cain after he's killed his brother.
That's what Joshua asks Achen after he has taken some of the devoted things and led them to destruction. That's what Samuel asks Saul. What have you done? He shows up at the end of the burnt offering. Samuel Saul goes out to meet him.
It says he went to meet and greet him. We don't know his posture. We don't know if he went down kind of like, "Oh, hey." Or if he was actually genuinely excited to see him, really relieved to see him. He's in trouble. And Samuel's been in this sort of thing before.
We don't exactly know. But immediately Samuel says, "What have you done?" The prophet of the Lord is standing with the king of Israel and he says, "What have you done?" And Saul said, "When I saw that the people were scattering from me, and that you did not come within the days appointed, and that the Philistines had mustered at Mcmash, I said, Now the Philistines will come down against me at Gilgal, and I have not sought the favor of the Lord." So I forced myself and offered the burnt offering. Now, if you'll notice, we're going to point out a few things here. One, the question was, "What have you done?" The answer is, "I offered the burnt offering." But there were a lot of words before we got to that, which as a parent of two young children, I experienced this on a weekly basis. Why is your brother crying?
Earlier this morning, I was having my breakfast. It's like, no, no, no, no, no. What did you do? Why is this broken?
Well, you see, while in the course of human events, no, no, no, no, no. G, get me to the answer. And he he puts off the answer, but he gives a lot of his reasoning. He's going to lay the groundwork for here's why I've done what I've done as he starts to explain it. And if we're being honest, if I'm reading this text, y'all, he was in a bad spot.
And none of the things he says sound to me like they have real good, clean answers. He says the people were leaving. Okay, that's a legitimate problem. I I mean, if we're there and you start seeing soldiers packing up in groups and heading out and people are starting to go, "Well, if Samuel's not coming." And they they're like, "Let's best thing to do is pick a cave.
Let's go." Like you you they've been looking to Saul to do something. And what he's been telling them is, "Wait, we're waiting for Samuel. We're waiting for Samuel. We're waiting for Samuel." Well, Samuel doesn't show up at the appointed time. Now, we don't know if this was later in the day on day seven or if this is day eight or day nine.
It just says you didn't show at the appointed time. I have a feeling that Samuel feels a little bit like where Gandalf says that a wizard is never early or late. He shows up right when he wants to. I think he probably feels that's what prophets get to do. Prophets aren't late.
They show up when they want to. Like I'm whenever I'm here, it's go time and not a second before. But he says, "You weren't here." The only answer he apparently had been giving them was we're waiting for Samuel or Samuel doesn't come. He'd been telling them we're waiting seven days. We're waiting seven days.
He's coming. He's coming. He's coming. He doesn't come. Then he says, I saw that they had gathered and I started thinking they're going to attack us.
So I I forced myself. I was forced. I had to. I had to. And y'all, do you ever feel that situation where you feel like you've got to do something?
People are expecting something of you. You feel like something's got to happen. Something's got something's got to be handled. And you just This was bad. This is bad.
This is bad. This is bad. I had to. As a pastor, I'll talk with people and they'll go, "What what do you want?
What do you How would you do this? How would you handle this? How would you handle this?" And there's really no there's no good earthly answer. Samuel doesn't have Well, here's how to keep the morale of people. Have y'all ever tried to lead something where where like you had to keep morale?
Like y'all, I've I've worked at a fireworks store my pretty much my whole life. Grew up in it. I managed a firework store since the time I was 18. And I've been managing for two busy days around Fourth of July 20 teenagers. Two days.
And they're getting paid to be there. there. And I've had times where I'm like, "Oo, this is falling apart. I got to send some of them home because of their attitudes, but I can't send all of them home. I can't have a coup." Like, I just trying to manage some teenagers for two days.
Go coach a little league team. See if you don't have some morale issues where you're like, "I'm losing it. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to lead this." He's trying to lead the people of Israel in a very terrible situation. And he feels like I I had to.
Here's what Samuel says. Verse 13. And Samuel said to Saul, "You have done foolishly." What you said is so foolish. What you've done is so foolish. Your approach to this is so unwise.
You've done foolishly. You have not kept the command of the Lord your God with which he commanded you. You were commanded a command. A command from the Lord. A command.
You were commanded a command. You didn't do it. That's Samuel's response. Saul's saying, "What what do you expect me to do?" Samuel says, "I expect you to obey. That's what I expect you to do.
I expect you to have followed the command of the Lord." I think we need to see in this text that there is no set of circumstances that excuses disobedience. That there there is no set of circumstances that excuses sin. That there is not a time when you get to look at the Lord and say, "I had to." There is not a time where obedience wasn't an option. We don't get to say things like, "Well, I if I didn't if we didn't sleep together, they'd break up with me. If we don't live together, I don't know how we'll pay our bills.
If I tell the truth about this, I'll never I'll I'll be the worst salesman in the company." Well, this is just how our industry works. There just isn't a time when we can list out a set of circumstances. Y'all, this is as bad as earthly stuff gets. There's not a time where obedience isn't an option. There's not a time where disobedience is excused.
That's Samuel's answer. What What would you do? What would you have me do? He says, I'd have you obey. I'd have you act like the Lord is the Lord.
So this what he says. You've done foolishly. You've not kept the command of the Lord your God with which he commanded you. For then the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever. But now your kingdom shall not continue.
So prophetically proclaiming, it's not going to follow your line. Y'all are done. The Lord has sought out a man after his own heart. That's David. We're going to see that.
And the Lord has commanded him to be prince over his people because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you. Okay. What Saul did in his in this moment of absolute trying to fix the situation was what? He He offered a burnt offering. That's what he did.
That was the disobedience. He offered a burnt offering. And that apparently he had been commanded to wait for Samuel to do that. So he does a a thing that Samuel was going to do, a good thing. The activity is good.
It not his place to do it. But the problem is he does it in disobedience. So he does a good religious activity that he thinks this is a good thing we're supposed to do. We're going to seek the favor of the Lord. He does that action, but it's wrong.
That that is actually the disobedience that he has is in that exact moment. So there's obedience that's driven by faith. There's obedience that's driven by faith. That's what Samuel expected from Saul. And there is religious activity that's driven by fear.
When Saul does this, it's very clear that he doesn't know the Lord. He doesn't understand him. He He's treating him with a fundamental misunderstanding of his goodness, of his sovereignty, of his kindness. He's doing a religious activity. He's doing a thing that's okay to do, a thing that's even good to do, but he's doing it with the wrong motive.
He's doing it with the wrong heart. Samuel was going to show up and offer a burnt offering. But Samuel was going to do it to a Lord that he knew, to a Lord that he trusted, and because the Lord is good. Saul did it. same thing, same activity, but he did it trying to seek the favor of the Lord as if he's not in a position where the people of Israel are already favored, where he as the king is already favored, where God is already good and kind and merciful and gracious.
He did it as if somehow God could be bought. He's not treating him like he knows him. He's treating him like a mob boss. Do you realize that?
Like it could be the same gift, a nice watch, and it can be given to someone because you love them. You want them to enjoy it. You enjoy the relationship. You're trying to develop the relationship. Or it could be given as a bribe.
If I give it because I love them, I'm I'm honoring them. If I give it as a bribe, I'm dishonoring them. I'm saying, I think you're the type of person who will accept a bribe, who needs one, whose favor must be bought. So that in doing this action, he actually dishonors the Lord and fundamentally shows he doesn't understand who he is and what he's like and how kind he is and how merciful he is. And there's a way for us to do things to do the practices of Christianity over here like Samuel would have where it's in response to who he is and how good he is and how glorious he is and how kind he is.
And there's a way for us to do it like Saul was going like Saul did it. That this is faith-based and based off of who he is. It's in dependence on God and his goodness. This is somehow circularly self-reliant. What I mean by that is Saul's like, "Yeah, I did the thing.
Now he does his thing somehow based off of Saul's activity. This shows up in our life. You'll hear it. You may hear yourself say it. You may hear someone else say it.
You may feel it when you're thinking through things. You'll say things like, "I don't know why it's not working. I'm doing what I'm supposed to." Meaning, I I did my religious activity which rolls up to God who goes, "Thank you for your payment." And then here come your blessings. You'll hear people say, "Yeah, I tried Christianity. It didn't work." Meaning, I did the activities.
And the things are the same. Prayer, being a part of a community group, walking in Church family, being kind, being generous, sharing the Gospel. serving. Same activities, completely different heart posture. There's a way for you to be utterly terrified and exhausted in your relationship to Jesus.
You're like, "This is so hard. It's so hard to be a Christian." And it's possible. That's because you're over here. There's no joy. There's no peace.
There's no forgiveness. There's no hope because he's not that good. It's really hard to appease a mob boss and hope you get good things out of it. That is a stressful situation. There's a way for us to be full of activity and have zero faith.
So obedience is expected. There's actually no other option but obedience. But it's obedience from this heart posture that God is good, that he's sovereign, that he's kind, that he's merciful, and that we can trust him. That Samuel would be like, "Yeah, how about you just trust him?" You know, you know Samuel was there when God defeated the Philistines with thunder.
Saul's like, "The army's leaving." Samuel's like, "They are I don't see how you don't know how unimportant your army is. If the God if God is for you, who can be against you? But all Saul sees is what's right in front of him. And he wants there to be obedience that's faith-based. Not obedience.
You could say, "Well, I'm doing all the stuff." But see, what happens a lot of times is we excuse our sin and then try to do enough religious activity to make God pleased with us. Rather than to walk in obedience, trusting the Lord to be kind and good because he is where there's joy and peace and forgiveness. Okay. Verse 15. Samuel arose and went up from Gilgal.
And the rest of the people went up after Saul to meet the army. They went up from Gilgal to Gibia of Benjamin. And Saul numbered the people who were present with him about 600 men. So when he said people were scattering, he went from 3,000 fighting men hoping people were going to be showing up, waiting for them to get ready, waiting for the people to come to him at Gilgal. And all that ends up happening is he gets down to under 25% of what he had.
In Judges chapter 7, the Midianites were like the sand on the seashore. And Gideon had 10,000 men and God said, "It's too many." And wielded him down to 300 and then won the victory. If Saul knew what God was like, if he knew what he was like, he'd be looking at 600 being like, I don't know, maybe too many. But Saul's not Gideon. And his heart isn't towards God because that's what Samuel says.
He's going to go find someone whose heart knows it, whose heart drawn toward him. And Saul and Jonathan his son, and the people who were present with them stayed in Gibba of Benjamin, which is the place they won. But the Philistines encamped at Mcmash. And raiders came out of the camp of the Philistines and three companies. One company turned towards Oprah to the land of Shuall.
Another company turned towards Beth Horon. and another company turned toward the border that looks down on the valley of Zebuim toward the wilderness. So, we're going to pick up there next week. Philistines are on the move and this is going poorly. But I want to show you what what Samuel says.
Look back at 13. You have not kept the command of the Lord your God with which he commanded you. For then the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever. But now your kingdom shall not continue. The Lord has sought out a man after his own heart.
And the Lord has commanded him to be prince over his people because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you. This text, this situation, the people of Israel is crying out for a faithful king, someone who will obey the commandment of the Lord, have a kingdom forever. And he says he's gonna find him. Ultimately in the story of 1 Samuel that's David and then the promise of an eternal kingdom is made to David that from David is going to come a king who this is fulfilled in the people who are hiding. They need someone to stand in for them and be faithful.
They need someone if Saul just had faith if he just trusted. If if Samuel had shown up and it was just Saul and Jonathan and he says, "Where is everybody?" And he said, "They all left, but we waited on you and we trust the Lord." You can feel, you almost know Samuel would say, "Oh, the Lord is trustworthy. It's going to be just fine." But he doesn't. But they needed somebody to stand in, somebody to have faith on their behalf, somebody to go ahead of them. And they don't have it.
Samuel says, "God's going to get it." And that is ultimately fulfilled in Christ. And I want you to know that we have that. that in the midst of our disobedience that we try to excuse by our circumstance and in the midst of our religious activity that dishonors God rather than honors him, in the midst of the times that we think he owes us something, that we actually have someone who has gone before us, who has ex executed his kingship faithfully, who has fulfilled the commandments of the Lord and who has stood in to claim the victory on behalf of all of us. That our hope is not in our behavior or our religious activity. It's not in our obedience.
that's in his and then we follow him in obedience. Not placing our hope in our obedience, but placing our hope in him. The king who's gone before us, who has secured the victory. What what the people hiding in rocks and tombs and sistns are waiting for is the news that hey, come out. The king has won.
Come out. He was faithful on our behalf. Come out. Hear hear the good news of the rescue and the hope. And I would say to you that if you are like the New Testament says, dead in your trespasses and sins, there is a king who has been who has fulfilled the commandment on your behalf, who is good and has gone before and who has won the victory.
And you can come put your trust in him. You can come place your hope in him. And that Church family, as we follow him, we get to fall in joyful obedience because he's already accomplished everything for us. This text begs for the king that we get to have. So may we rejoice that we don't have to hide.
That we aren't going to be conquered because our hope is finished and fulfilled and accomplished in Christ in his death, burial, and resurrection. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your grace and your mercy. And we thank you that we get the hope that is missing in this story. That you do have a king after your own heart who has followed your commandments and has a kingdom forever.
And may we rejoice and may we follow in obedience. May we put aside all our religious activity that is somehow set up to make you pleased with us and trust that Christ has has done the work to bring us in and that your pleasure is for all those who have trusted in him. We have freedom and hope. May we repent of sin and our disobedience and may we run to Jesus in Jesus name. Amen.
Band's going to come back up. We're going to take communion which is a practice given to us by Jesus to proclaim his death until he comes. It is for the Church if you have not placed your hope in Jesus. Communion is not for you because it is us saying that what stands between us who has gone before us where our hope lies is in the broken body and the shed blood of Jesus. It is a tangible reminder of the reality of the cross, the hope of the resurrection.
And so, Church family, take a moment to consider your sin and your obedience, your religious activity to see whether or not that you are excusing rebellion or practicing religious activity for the sake of putting God on your good side in a way that dishonors him rather than acknowledges who he really is. and then joyfully come take communion where you remind yourself that Jesus Christ paid the penalty. Jesus Christ is the king who has executed faithfully the office so that he might have an eternal kingdom and that we are free. When you are ready, we invite you to take communion. And if you have a gluten allergy, there's communion in the back.
1 Samuel 12
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Spencer. I'm one of the pastors here. So, we are going to continue to walk through the book of 1 Samuel.
Uh we we typically just keep working through books of the Bible. We don't typically have a lot of Mother's Day or Father's Day sermons, but uh we will keep working through 1 Samuel. And we are in chapter 12 as we continue to walk through this uh this book. So when I was around five, six, somewhere in that range, I got to have this magical Christmas morning where I'm excited getting ready to tear down the stairs. Just go down and see what awaits.
So my brother and I at the top of the stairs just waiting. Can't go down till my mom and my stepdad uh come and then they go downstairs. They kind of make sure everything's ready and then we're we're ready. And they say, "Come on down." So, we descend down the stairs.
My brother's uh 18 months older than me, so this point a little bit faster. And he gets there and before he hits the bottom step, he says, "Spencer got more than me." He evaluated the situation. He looked without touching anything and said he got more than me, which I didn't have a problem at all. And what was happening is he was seeing what he did not have and was coveting, desiring was not this. And my stepdad, which I think this might have been one of his first uh few Christmases with us, was containing wrath.
Just was like seeing this child coveting, entitled bratty, just was holding it together to not ruin Christmas morning. It's an amazing memory, you guys. What uh my brother was was coveting. He was just he just saw something he didn't have. It's so visceral.
It's it's not it's natural to a lot of children and to humanity. Seeing things you don't have and desiring it. And that's what we've seen from the Israelites these last few chapters that they desired to have a king like the nations. They wanted an earthly king to rule them and to reign over them and fight their battles for them. And much like my stepdad, uh Samuel the prophet is angry.
He is upset with this. And we're going to see that in this address today. Now, if you have a blue Bible and you're reading through this in our Bibles, sometimes you'll see these these headings that kind of describe the text below it. And a lot of times they're really helpful. They can help us understand, you know, main idea what's about to happen in this text.
And a lot of them will say Samuel's farewell address. Uh but this is not the end of Samuel. This is one of those times I'm like h you know probably wouldn't call it a farewell address. This is he's not going away. In fact the very next chapter he's got some very important work to do.
This is a transitionary point between the era of the judges and the era of the kings. So in that sense there's some transition here. This work's not done. And he's not George Washington doing his final speech riding off into the sunset at Mount Vernon to retire and never be seen again. But in this address of what he has to say to the whole nation of Israel, we're going to see why it was wicked for them to desire to have a king like the nations.
And I want us to sit in that and understand it uh both from their perspective but also from this side of Christ as well. So let me pray for us then we'll walk through this together. Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us understand your word. That you'd give us ears to hear. That we would be not just hearers of the word, but we'd be doers of the word.
And we would respond how you desire and in faith and repentance and in delighting in you above all things. We ask this in Jesus name. Amen. All right.
So just refresher the last few weeks what we've seen is that the people uh desired this king. They go to Samuel. So we want a king. And then Samuel listens to the people. He gives them a king.
He sees Saul. God chooses Saul. He anoints him, coordinates. We saw last week the coronation, the installation. He's the king.
And then we saw how the Ammonites led by Nahesh rose up against the people of uh Jabeshgilead. And then Saul gathers the people together. All the tribes come. They fight. They defeat the Ammonites.
And we pick up here in chapter 12. Now, we don't know if this is directly after that victory or if this is sometime later, but he's got all the tribes together to address him here. And I want to give some structure to what we're going to see in this speech because sometimes in the Scriptures you'll see these these passages are structured in a certain way. And the speech is structured in this way. It's called a kayazm or some will call it kayastic.
But here's the structure of the speech. It starts with it's going to be Samuel's faithfulness followed by God's response. And here's where the kayazm comes. The kaism comes from the Greek letter kai which is an X. So you're going to see part of an X here.
This is why it's called this. So the center point is going to be covenant faithfulness which in a kayazm that's the main idea. That's the big part of this speech. And then it mirrors backwards. It's going to followed by God's response ending in Samuel's faithfulness.
So it's a very creative structure. You see this sometimes in the Scriptures, but that's a helpful interpretive key because that's going to help us understand what is the big problem with choosing an earthly king. So that is how this is going to go. And we're going to start with Samuel's faithfulness in verse one. And Samuel said to all Israel, "Behold, I have obeyed your voice and all that you have said to me and have made a king over you.
And now, behold, the king walks before you, and I am old and gray, and behold, my sons are with you. I have walked before you from my youth until this day. So, Samuel has been leading the people of God for for many decades at this. He's been leading the people of God faithfully since he was young. I mean, remember how First Samuel began.
Remember Hannah who desiring a child when she did not have one, prayed earnestly, a godly woman, praying before the Lord for a child and making a vow to the Lord and say, "Lord, if you if you would bless me with this child, if you would do this, I'll I'll dedicate him in service to you all of his life," which it is Mother's Day. And just to appreciate that idea right there of praying for your children earnestly that God might work in them in mighty ways and then God answers that prayer and then Samuel comes and he spends the rest of his life serving the Lord and now he's old and he's gray. just to see how that story comes together that he's at the end of his days and he's got a few more things ahead of him. But it is this big transition. He's heading off leadership to the era of the kings and that he is in here solidifying that I was faithful in my leadership.
Verse three, here I am. Testify against me before the Lord and before his anointed. That's the king soul. Whose ox have I taken?
Or whose donkey have I taken? Or whom have I defrauded? Whom have I oppressed? Or from whose hand have I taken a bribe to blind my eyes with it?
Testify against me and I will restore it to you. So he puts forth this resume of faithful leadership. One of the things that I appreciate about this resume, it it's not a list of accomplishments of all the things that Samuel has done. It's a list of faithfulness and character. You see that he says, "I haven't taken your oxen.
I haven't taken your donkeys. Who have I defrauded? Who have I oppressed? I've not taken bribes and as a judge in this land and enriched myself." He points to his integrity and his character, which I appreciate is just a picture of leadership in general. that godly leadership is one that is centralized on character.
I mean you get that in the New Testament too in 1 Timothy chapter 3 and in Titus 1 when it gets qualifications of an elder and overseer pastor that you see these qualifications are character mostly characterbased and that's what he's pointing to see how I've walked in integrity faithful leadership testify against me oh everyone here the nations King Saul have I not walked in integrity and the people respond they said you have not defrauded us or oppressed us or taken anything from any man's hand. And he said to them, "The Lord is witness against you and is anointed is witness this day. You have f not found anything in my hand." And they said, "He is witness." So the nation affirms this. Yes, Samuel. All these many decades you've been a faithful leader, a godly man in service in your leadership.
Now that's part one of this. Now we're going to shift to God here and the focus is going to be on God. Now to understand the next part and to really appreciate what we're about to read, you need to understand the backdrop of the two covenants that the people live under. There are two covenants that the people of God at this point in the history of Israel that they live under. The Abrahamic covenant and the Mosaic covenant.
So the Abrahamic covenant is goes back to their father Abraham had many sons. Many sons had father Abraham that Abraham back in Genesis. It goes back to Abraham when God makes a covenant with Abraham establishing that I'm going to make a great nation and a mighty people through you Abraham. And in that covenant it's called a unilateral covenant which just means it's all on one party and the party is God. that God says it's on me that I will bless you Abraham and make a great nation through you and your line and all the 12 tribes of Israel are under that covenant.
They come from Abraham. So that is a covenant that they live under as the people of God. The second covenant that they live under is the Mosaic covenant. This is the covenant of Moses. This is the law.
And this covenant is different. over here is an unconditional covenant through Abraham that's all on God. The second one is called a bilateral covenant means it's two parties involved in this agreement and it's a conditional co where on one side God says I will bless you if you obey the law. If you'll follow the law, it will go well for you. That's that's Deuteronomy chapter 30 as Moses is is reading the law before they're getting ready to enter the promised land and says, "If you follow the Lord, you'll be blessed.
If you don't, you will be cursed. Bring curses upon yourself." And that's the Mosaic covenant. Now, it's important because both of those covenants, if you do a careful reading here, you're going to see the language show up all throughout the rest of this. So, it's helpful to have that in mind.
The people understood as they're about to hear the next part of this as Samuel shifts the focus from his faithful leadership to the Lord. Starting in verse six, and Samuel said to the people, "The Lord is witness who appointed Moses and Aaron and brought your fathers up out of the land of Egypt. Now therefore, stand still that I may plead with you before the Lord concerning all the righteous deeds of the Lord that he performed for you and your fathers. So he says, "Stand still and listen." You need to hear everything that God has done for you. Sometimes I got to get my children's attention and say, "Do you realize all the things that we do for you as parents?
I need you to listen to me here. I need you to trust me here. I need you to follow what I'm saying here. You are five and I am older. Just listen.
Listen to all the things that God has done for you. When Jacob went into Egypt and the Egyptians oppressed them, then your fathers cried out to the Lord. The Lord sent Moses and Aaron who brought your fathers out of Egypt and made them dwell in this place. But they've forgot the Lord their God. What we're getting here is history of God's faithfulness to children of Abraham.
Remember how you were in Egypt as slaves and I rescued you and brought you out of Egypt. Remember how I gave you the promised land, a land flown with milk and honey. I gave it to you. I defeated your enemies. I brought you into this land.
And then it continues. And he sold them, but they forgot their lord. They forgot the Lord their God. Verse 9. And he sold them into the hand of Cicora, commander of the army of Hazard, into the hand of the Philistines, into the hand of the king of Moab, and they fought against them.
And that is I gave you the promised land. So we're going Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, you settle the promised land. Book of Judges. What happens in the book of Judges when you read the book of Judges is that the people of God reject God. They go after lesser gods.
And then the Mosaic covenant, if you do not follow the law, you bring curses upon yourself. And that's what happens. All these enemies here, so Cicero, the Philistines, the king of Moab, they come and they rule over the people. This is over centuries of time. And it says, ' And they cried out to the Lord and said, 'We have sinned because we have forsaken the Lord and have served the bales and the Ashth, but now deliver us out of the hand of our enemies that we may serve you.
That's a again that's from the book of Judges where at times the people of God realize they've they've messed up. They've gone after foreign gods and they're pleading with God, save us. And God responds to that cry. And the Lord sent Jerob Gerobal which that's Gideon and Barack and Japth and Samuel to love. Samuel's the final judge and love.
He just puts himself and sent me the final judge and delivered you out of the hand of your enemies on every side and you lived in Satan. So God helps him remember in these covenants you are a special people because you belong to Abraham. But when you are weward and you reject me and you chase after other gods and you don't live in covenant with me, remember what happens. He's helping them remember this is what I have done for you as my people. The evil in your wayward.
I still respond in grace and ascend faithful leaders to come. And then we get to verse 12, which all of that is helpful for setting up the indictment that Samuel's about to levy against the people. And when you saw that Nahash, the king of the Ammonites came against you, you said to me, "No, but a king shall reign over us." When the Lord your God was king. Now, that's a very helpful verse.
I want you to remember what we've read this far the last few weeks. People come to Samuel. They ask for a king. Samuel listens to the Lord, gives them Saul. Saul is anointed.
He's established. Then we see the story of Nahash and the Ammonites. They come, they surround Jabesh Gilead. Saul unites the tribes. They come and fight.
They defeat the Ammonites. Nowhere in those few chapters did it mention this important piece of information that the Ammonites were already a looming threat. It was already in their mind that the Ammonites next door were getting bigger and getting strong getting stronger and they had this mighty king Nash and they see that and in their fear they desire what they should not want. They covet and they say, "We want a king like that. We want a king like the enemy has and not you, oh Lord." And that is a big deal because here's how this was supposed to work.
What was supposed to happen is that when they settle the promised land, they live in covenant relationship with their God. They see the laws and what we we sang Psalm 19 this morning. all the language of how wonderful the law is, how wonderful the word of God is. They're supposed to love the law and and and the way that was set up was you had these 12 tribal regions and really in the center is what the tabernacle was. And every few months they'd go to the tabernacle and they'd worship the Lord and they'd offer sacrifices.
They do festivals like the Passover, which is a festival that helps them remember the God who saves you, the God who rescued you from Egypt. They would worship God and delight in him. And they didn't need an earthly king because they just have the Lord and they have worship and he's he's ruling and reigning from the tabernacle. And if ever there was going to be an enemy that knocked on the door of Israel and made threats against them, they could just plead before the Lord for help and he would respond. This is the God you see sometimes in the Old Testament.
They don't even go out to battle against their enemies. He just causes confusion in the camp and they kill each other and they're done. That's how powerful and mighty God is. He can Thanos snap and done. They're just done.
That's how God can work. They just would trust him if they would trust their covenant God. That's how it's supposed to be. They don't want that. They don't believe that God is good.
They don't believe that God can protect them. They don't believe God provide for them. They don't trust God. Their hearts are chasing after lesser gods, lesser things. We want a king who will rule us like they want a king who will go out and fight our battles like they.
They were supposed to be different, y'all. They were supposed to be a holy nation. They were supposed to be a light among the nations. They were supposed to The other nations were supposed to look at Israel and see there's something different about this people. They just they love their God.
They have one just just the one and they love their God and they worship him and he'd be mess with them because we we know the stories of those who mess with this God and his people and they supposed to look so good and so wonderful living in covenant relationship with their God that the people would even wonder who maybe we should just worship this God alone supposed to be but they reject that and the rejection is not small and is a massive projection of covenant God, symptomatic of a bigger problem of covenant unfaithfulness than the people of God. Verse 14, if you will fear Lord and serve him and obey his voice and not rebel against the commandment of the Lord, that both you and the king who reigns over you will follow the Lord your God, it will be well. But if you will not obey the voice of the Lord but rebel against the commandment of the Lord, then the hand of the Lord will be against you and your king. So I think I might have skipped verse 13, but the verse 13 going back says, "And now behold the king whom you have chosen for whom you have asked. Behold the Lord has set a king over you." Which is just this.
You have asked for it and you've gotten him. And that's where you are now as you've rejected God in favor of an earthly king. And you're here now. So as you're here, if you will fear the Lord and you'll serve him and know you will obey his voice and not rebel against the commandment of the Lord and that both you and the king who reigns over you will follow the Lord, it will be well. That is the language of the Mosaic covenant, you guys.
That's what's happening here. So I'm not I'm not not abandoning you. You still are my people, the children of Abraham. So now respond in faithfulness. But if you don't, if you will not obey the voice of the Lord, if you rebel against him, the hand of the Lord will be against you and your king.
And there's this picture of curses will come upon you. And again, that's the language of the law. That's the language of Deuteronomy 30 when Moses is telling the people before they enter the promised land after years of watching them rebel be a stiff necked people says that you you need to follow the Lord serve him with your whole heart love him above all things or it's going to go poorly for you that's also the speech that Joshua gives the end of the book of Joshua in Joshua chapter 24 says you need to follow the Lord with your whole heart. If you don't, it's going to go poorly for you. And this rejection and and and desiring this earthly king is symptomatic of this covenant unfaithfulness.
They don't love God. They don't trust God. They don't serve him with their whole heart. They're divided amongst lesser gods and lesser things. So, at the very centerpiece of this speech, Samuel is saying, "Here's the here's why what you did was so wicked.
You you want an earthly king and you live in covenant unfaithfulness." And here's God's continued response starting in verse 16. Now, therefore, stand still. Same language as above. Stand still and see this great thing the Lord will do before your eyes. He's about to confirm this.
Is it not wheat harvest today? I will call upon the Lord that he may send thunder and rain, and you shall know and see that your wickedness is great, which you have done in the sight of the Lord, and asking for yourselves a king." So Samuel called upon the Lord and the Lord sent thunder and rain that day and all the people greatly feared the Lord and Samuel. So he's like here here's some confirmation of your wickedness, of your rejection of God as your king. What's going to happen is thunder and rain. It's going to come in the middle of the wheat harvest.
Now, it's hard for us to put our minds in in their minds and see how big of a deal this is because we are so used to we see we think so scientifically about the weather. Just pull out your app and see well we know how weather we don't see the providential work of God at work and the weather. And for them like that that our God is in the heavens. They understand that. So God is in control of all of this.
So they just they're just more clued into the providential nature of how God works even in the weather. But it's wheat harvest which in their climate is a time that is dry. The rainy season was before. We're in the air at dry season now. It's the middle of wheat harvest.
So the I the fact that a storm is just going to appear out of nowhere is confirmation of their wickedness. And the moment that the sky turns black and the lightning strikes, the thunder roars, the rains fall, they get it. And it's terrifying. They understand they have really really sinned against God. They understand this starting in verse 19.
And all the people said to Samuel, "Pray for your servants to the L pray for your servants to the Lord your God that we may not die. For we have added to all our sins this evil to ask for ourselves a king. We we we've added to our sins. We've rejected you, God. We've asked for a king, and we don't want to die for our wickedness.
Verse 20. And Samuel said to the people, "Do not be afraid. You have done all this evil, yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart." Again, that's the Mosaic covenant at work. It's God's grace. You're not going to be just You're not going to be destroyed in judgment right now, but now is the time to turn aside from hearts that chase after lesser things.
Return to the Lord. Serve him with all of your heart, not divided. All of your heart. Verse 21. Do not turn aside after empty things they cannot profit or deliver, for they are empty.
The Lord will not forsake his people for his great name's sake because it flees the Lord to make you a people for himself. And that's that's the language of the Abrahamic covenant that this is God's people that he claimed for himself, for his glory, for his name's sake. See, both of those at play here when the people say, "We we've messed up. We don't want to die. Don't bring judgment.
And Samuel says, "Not going to, but return. Now's the time for repentance. Now is the time to return back to the Lord. Now is the time to uphold the law as good. For he's chosen you for his name's sake, for his glory." And then he adds of this in verse 23.
Moreover, as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you and I will instruct you in a good and right way. So as we're moving back in this kayazm, it's now this is his faithfulness on display. Now, I heard somebody comment on this the other day and they were talking about this passage and they said, I mean, I bet this is more Samuel saying, "I'm going to pray for you because y'all y'all have messed up." And it's the same line as Joshua because Joshua kind of says that I'm going to pray for you is going to the promised land, but probably not going to work out for you based on everything I've seen. And Moses kind of has a little bit of the same posture in Jeremiah 30. I'm going pray for you.
And I think, sure, there might be some elements of that where it's like, I'm I'm going to pray for you. But I think even more to what's happening here is it just displays Samuel's faithfulness and saying, "No, go. Y'all have messed up. I'm devoted to trying to to help you still. And I will I my faithful leadership is I will not stop praying." And it's such a a a godly example of of of good leadership.
I'm not going to stand against the Lord. I know my calling. I will continue to pray ceaseless prayer for you and I will continue to teach you the good and right way. I think this is more just know this is this is Samuel being a faithful leader even still. And this is how this chapter ends.
Verse 24. Only fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart. For consider what great things he has done for you. But if you still do wicked, you shall be swept away, both you and your king. So he says, "Fear the Lord.
Serve him faithfully because of the great things that he has done. And if you don't, surely judge me." That address period of the judges. It's over. The era of the kings has begun. It's a new era of leadership.
They will serve the Lord both. Notice the king and his people. If the king and his people will both serve the Lord wholeheartedly and faithful, it's going to go well. You'll be blessed. And if you read the rest of 1st Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1st Kings, 2 Kings, 1st Chronicles, 2 Chronicles, you know it is not going to go well because both the king and the people are continuously going to reject God, worship other gods instead, and ultimately curses are going to come upon them.
But I want to help us see how they are marked out of this whole passage has the backdrop of these two covenant. The back end chapter back in verse 22 when it says for the people will not forsake for the Lord will not forsake his people for his great name's sake because it has pleased the Lord to make you a people for himself. That's God saying you you belong to me that my people belong to me for my glory. And then also verse 20 that they are people of the law of Moses and the Mosaic covenant. And Samuel said to the people, "Do not be afraid.
You have done all this evil. Yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart. Do not turn aside after empty things that cannot profit or deliver for they are empty. They belong to the Lord as his people. They still you follow the Lord.
They'll turn aside and they do over and over again. I mean it's it's it is a tragic story over and over where you see glimpses of God's faithfulness to his people. They're the people of God as children of Abraham. And then you also see they just keep folding on their face. They keep worshiping the Bales and Ash and all these other lesser gods.
They keep doing horrible practices all the way to sacrificing the king sacrificing his own child to a foreign God. You'll see this over and over and over again. When I read how the people were called to live and this faithfulness to the Lord through his law, it's it's it's it's kind of overwhelming to think this nation living under the under the conditional covenant of the law of Moses that just hung over to them, how they fall short over and over again. But on this side today as we read this now from our vantage point I can understand from their perspective that's overwhelming and also from our perspective thanks thankfulness that we no longer live under the Mosaic covenant. We don't live under the law.
We're not people of the law. Because when Jesus comes and he begins his ministry and in Matthew chapter 5 when he's teaching the sermon on the mount, he says this. He says, "Do not think that I've come to abolish the law of the prophets. I do not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them." There's so many Israelites that failed to uphold the law. They could not fulfill the law.
They could not obey the law. When Samuel says, "Don't turn aside. Don't turn aside and chase after lesser things." There's only one who does. Jesus doesn't turn aside once. Every letter of the law, every mark perfectly.
And Jesus fulfills the law perfectly. And then he goes to the cross. And that in Christ and faith in what he has done, we get this unbelievable offer of his perfect record and his perfect righteousness. School growing up, I was not a great student. I had to work hard for every grade I got because I'm just doesn't come naturally to me.
So, you know, sometimes C's get degrees, you guys. So, that and I just I had to work and struggle just to make decent grades. And there were always people in the class. There's always someone one or two or three people that just were so good at it. They just made it just came easy to them and they just made straight A's.
They just killed it. And so many times I just want to sit behind them and look at that test and just get every one of those answers down so I could just at one point finally just be ex at school. Uh and the offer that we get in Christ is he hands us the test. Perfection and says it's yours. Bad students, bad followers of the law, can't check all the boxes.
Not even close. Here it is. You can have this if you just trust in me. That's the offer that is given to us this side of the law. Christ in Galatians 3 captures this in even more detail in chapter 310.
It says, "For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse. For it is written, cursed be everyone who does not abide by all the things written in the book of the law and do them." There's this picture of the Mosaic covenant that same that language right there that were people were called to live out the law and all of its teachings and they couldn't and because of that they were cursed. Verse 11, now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law for the righteous shall live by faith. It's the language of being a child of Abraham. But verse 12, the law is not of faith.
Rather, the one who does them shall live by them, Christ redeemed us from the cursed law by becoming a curse for us. For it is written, cursed is everyone who is hanged on the tree. And that's the good news of the Gospel that Jesus has the perfect life. And then we who cannot fulfill the requirements of the law and should receive the judgment that comes with that, Jesus takes that judgment, that curse upon himself on the tree. When he rises from the grave and defeats the power of death and its grip on us, that offer is made to all of us in faith so that in Christ Jesus, verse 14, the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles.
That's us. So that we might receive the promised spirit through faith. So when I read stories like this in the Old Testament and I see the high calling that they were called to live and the bar that was set, I'm just thankful. I'm just thankful to live in the covenant Christ and what he has done for us. So that when I go back and I read verse 24 when it says, "Only fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart.
Four. Consider what great things he has done for you. For them, they had the history up until that point. And we have so much more. We should be a people who consider, who consider, who stare deeply at, who ponder upon, who meditate on the great things that God has done for us.
And that is the redemption that we have in Christ to his life, death, and resurrection that we just walked through. But there's so much more that we get to consider as Christians that we should consider in Christ and the great things he has done for us. I just want to list a few of these. We should consider that Christ is our king. It's one of the great things he has done for us is that he established a kingdom that will never end and a kingdom that's better than this world.
That as 1 Timothy 6 says that he is the king of kings. that when he ascended to the right hand of God the Father when he rules and reigns, he offers a better kingdom. And so much of our effort and our toil is building kingdoms in this world that won't last. Building kingdoms that we think are good that never satisfy. And we have a king that loves us so much to so that he gave up his life for us and he invites us into a better kingdom.
We should consider our king. We should consider that Jesus is our high priest as Hebrews 4 teaches that he stands in the heavens as our great high priest. Meaning that even when we are struggling and even when we are falling on our face and sin that we can come before the Lord and come before the father in prayer boldly and confidently not because of us because Jesus our high priest stands offering prayers on behalf of his people. It's a wonderful gift that we've been given to have access to God even though we still fall short of the glory that he has called us into. We should consider that he is our mediator.
1 Timothy chapter 2, he is the man in the middle that stands between us and God the father. That every time that we feel the shame of our sin, we can look to our savior and say, "Thank you, Jesus, that you're our mediator. You stand in the middle. That you take my place." We should consider that Jesus Christ is our friend. John 15 teaches that he's a friend to us.
That he's mighty and he's powerful and he's worthy of worship and he also has this intimate nearness that is given to us to be friends God. We should consider that he's a victor over evil. that Colossians 2 teaches that he put the enemy, that's Satan and the demonic, to open shame and triumphing over them. That when we're attacked by the enemy, we can look to Christ as our victor over evil. That we can pray the Lord's prayer.
We can receive what God has given us. We should see Jesus as our wonderful author and finisher of our faith as Hebrews chapter 12 teaches that he is the God who began our faith and will finish it. Philippians 1 that he carries us through to complete him. And that's on him. Every time that I'm tired, every time that I'm struggling, and in seasons where I just feel how hard it is to follow God, I remember he's the one who began it.
Now, he's the one that will carry me home. I can remember Ephesians chapter 2 that Jesus is our cornerstone. Meaning, he's the foundation that my faith is built upon, which means that I don't have to be the strength in this faith. I can rest upon the rock that is Christ. And all the times I get that twisted and I think that it's on me.
God enliven and awakens my eyes to see, it isn't. It's on Christ. that we get to consider. I'll just give you one more. That he's our good shepherd.
That as John chapter 10 teaches that Jesus Christ is our good shepherd. He's the best pastor, y'all. The chief shepherd. And at times we're weward. And at times where we're struggling, at times we're like a sheep that's wounded and limping.
That he lifts us up and he sustains us and he heals us and he carries us and we can't even walk. There's so many things that we get to consider in Christ that makes this God has done great things for us. And sometimes I just I'm so prone to being like an Israelite that forgets that. It just forgets it. And so easily I'll chase after lesser things.
And so easily I'll trust in human power like they did, looking for an earthly king to come. trusting myself, trusting in anyone else but God. Each of us fail to consider in so many ways the great things that God has done for us. But the good news is that Jesus Christ bled and died for men and women that fail, etc. So may we heed the call of Samuel to consider what God has done and to put our hope in him and him alone.
The band's going to come up. We just get a moment to end and worship. And as we worship, I just want us to take the time to do that, to actually consider to consider Christ. For some of you, I want you to be honest your own heart before the Lord. I want you to be honest and ask him questions because it's possible you've actually never considered the Lord.
You never considered him as your hope. as your only hope. You may have considered the things of this world, the empty philosophies of this world. You may have considered you and your strength and your power and your righteousness and your good record. You may have considered a whole bunch of other things, but you actually haven't considered Christ and Christ alone.
And my hope right now is that you would actually for the first time consider him in faith and trust in him alone. For those of us that belong to God, that we are children of Abraham through faith, may we consider the great things that he has done for us. And may that lead us to worship and delighting in him, anything this world has to offer. Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray that you would help us be a people that consider that as we heed Samuel's address and consider the ways in which what we have is so much better that it would lead us to faith. That it would lead us to worship that would lead us to trusting you above all things. But that comes through your work and the spirit at work in us. And we ask that you go to work in Jesus name. Amen.
1 Samuel 11
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. We are in First Samuel chapter 10, and we're picking up where we left off last week. Last week, we read about Saul being anointed as king. He went looking for some lost donkeys, and eventually, he went to a place where there was a prophet. It turned out that prophet was Samuel. Samuel sees Saul, and God tells Samuel, "That's him. That's the guy I told you was going to be king. I told you you'd see him today." And there he is. He anoints him as king. Saul goes to a dinner where he sits at the head of the table. Then he goes home and tells no one that he has been anointed king.
We're going to pick up today where we left off. Spencer told us a little bit about where this ends up with Saul, and that it doesn't go well for him. But we're not there yet in the story, and today we're going to look at how his story begins. It starts off okay. So, we're going to look at verse 17 of 1 Samuel chapter 10. It says this: Now Samuel called the people together to the Lord at Mispa. He said to the people of Israel, "Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, I've brought up Israel out of Egypt, and I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of all the kingdoms that were oppressing you. But today you have rejected your God, who saves you from all your calamities and your distresses, and you have said to him, 'Set a king over us.' Now therefore, present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes and by your thousands."
They said they want a king. They're bringing together to give them a king. Normally, in these sorts of things, the first person who gets up and talks pumps some ceremony and highlights the importance of the day. Samuel gets up and says, "You used to follow God who saves you from everything. You've rejected him, and today you won't have God. You'll have some guy." Now, line up. It's not the best start, but they're going to line up. They're going to choose a king by lot.
By lot just means a system for randomly choosing. We do some things by lot culturally; we don't call it that, but we draw straws, flip a coin, pull a name from a hat, hold a lottery, or a raffle. Paper rock scissors is just competitive lots where you feel like you won something, even though it was still pretty random.
A lot of things were done by lot historically and culturally all over the place. It just means they have a random system for choosing. They would use urim and thummim. They had the breastplate of the high priest that they would use for this at times. They also may have used some other different methods. People trusted that God would give them the answer through this.
This is not uncommon to them. We see a whole section of this playing out in Joshua chapter 7, where they are trying to find out who sinned against God, and they walk it all the way down to the household of Achan. So they're going to choose by lot. Samuel, verse 20, brings all the tribes of Israel near, and the tribe of Benjamin was taken by lot.
Now, God already told Samuel who was going to be king. Samuel already told Saul he was going to be king. They're going to do this now by lot. Samuel is going to see, and Saul's going to see, that God is overseeing the lot. But for everybody else, they're just going to see that this is how God works in choosing, and they may not have known or wouldn't have known already that Saul is the one to be chosen. But Benjamin is the tribe he comes from, that Saul is from.
It says the tribe of Benjamin was taken by lot. He brought the tribe of Benjamin near by its clans, and the clan of the Matrites was taken by lot. Saul, the son of Kish, was taken by lot. But when they sought him, he could not be found.
So, however they were taking lots and doing this, there was some sort of representative tokens or something used to pick a person because they selected a person who's not there. So the lot falls on Saul, the son of Kish, and he's not there.
They looked for him. So they're doing this, and they're like tribe of Benjamin. They move up, and then they do the next process, and they say the clan of the Matrites. Then everybody moves off, and the Matrites come near somehow and then they say Saul, the son of Kish. So is Saul here? Where's Saul? Like, they have to go look for him, and the whole country's here, and now we're looking for Saul. The whole process has stopped to the point that it says, "But when they sought him, he could not be found."
Verse 22: So they inquired again of the Lord, "Is there a man still to come?" It slows down so much that they're like, "Let's ask God again." They inquire of the Lord, "Are we waiting for somebody else? Did we do what is happening?" And God says, "Behold, he has hidden himself among the baggage."
We know that Saul showed up, but we don't know at what point he hid. Maybe it was right when they said line up. Maybe it was when Benjamin got picked and he thought, "Oh no." Maybe he waited till it was the Matrites, then he was like, "Oh no." But he definitely wasn't there when they said Saul, the son of Kish. The baggage is the luggage that everybody has shown up with; they just piled all their gear up, all their supplies in a certain spot. And Saul goes and hides, which is a real cute look for your new king.
So God tells them, "No, I picked the right person. He's hiding." Then it says, "Then they ran and took him from there." I would assume, just trying to picture this, they're excited. They run. I also think that means there's a lot of children involved. They say he's in the supplies, and everybody just takes off. This whole group takes off and finds Saul hiding.
I don't know how he hid. The text doesn't tell us. It's possible there was no one near the supplies and he just went there. It's possible he hid. You remember playing hide-and-seek? The better your hiding spot, the more awkward it is to get out of it once you've been caught. We're told that Saul's a big dude. I don't know if he was just tucked behind stuff, and they were like, "God told us you were here," and he came out. Or if he was in stuff, and they had to be like, "Hey man, get up," and he had to crawl out of things. But it's not a good look.
They bring him out. Samuel said to all the people, oh sorry, they ran and took him, and when he stood among the people, he was taller than any of the people from his shoulders upward. They bring him out, and he's a head taller than everybody. Samuel said to all the people, "Do you see him whom the Lord has chosen? There is none like him among all the people."
There are a couple of ways to understand what he's saying there. He possibly is just saying now that he is king, he stands above everybody else. Here's your king, and no one’s like him. It's a from now on kind of thing. It's also possible that all he's saying here is look at him, remember what he looks like, and he looks different than everybody. So later, when you see a guy who's taller than everybody, you can say, "Oh yeah, I remember that. That's our king." It's possible he's just commenting on what he looks like. It's also possible that what he means is now he stands above everybody, not literally but figuratively.
All the people shouted, "Long live the king." They've chosen the king. They know who it is, and they all shout, "Long live the king."
Samuel told the people the rights and duties of the kingship, wrote them in a book, and laid it before the Lord. We don't know what he wrote. My guess is it included some of the stuff we've read in Deuteronomy about what a king is supposed to be like. It probably included some things Samuel said—that if you get a king, he's going to do all this stuff—but he gives some restrictions, this is what a king is allowed to do, and duties, here's what he's supposed to do, has to do. He declares it all to everybody, like, "Alright, y'all got a king now and here's what a king can and can't do and should do." He writes it all down and puts it before the Lord.
Samuel sent all the people away, each to his home. We're going to get more information about how this plays out. I appreciate the detail. They get everybody together; they choose a king. Then they go play hide-and-seek with the king, find him, then Samuel says, "Look at him." He announces, and then he just goes, "Alright, go home."
We're told Saul goes home because they've never had a king before. He doesn't have a palace. He's no castle. They just say, "Here's what kings are allowed to do. You got one. Yay. Go home."
It says, "Saul also went to his home at Gibeah." He just was like, "Okay, I'm king now. I'm going home." With him went men of valor whose hearts God had touched.
God begins to work and sends brave, capable, valiant men with Saul. But some worthless fellows said, "How can this man save us?" They despised him and brought him no present. Other people were apparently prepared to give something to honor the king. But they're like, "We're not doing it. He'll get no present from us. We don't like him."
They despised him, brought him no present, but he held his peace. We're told God touches the hearts of valiant men, and these worthless men reject Saul. But I can't help but feel like the worthless men have a point. They're in a time of war. Part of the reason they've picked a king is they want someone to save them. That's part of the reason Samuel's upset with them: God saves them.
But they are constantly at war with the people around them. They want someone to go out and fight their battles. They say, "How can this guy save us?" Saul's start isn't a good one.
What do we know about Saul at this point? We've read chapters 9 and 10 and were introduced to him in chapter 9. We know his dad is wealthy. If you wanted to talk about that nicely, you'd say he's from a well-off family. If you didn't like Saul, you'd say, "Yeah, daddy's rich." You could spin that one way or the other.
We know his family is wealthy. We know Saul is tall and handsome, so if you wanted to date him, these are the categories you'd pick. I told you a couple of weeks ago that they're not the best ones, but tall, handsome, rich—that doesn't make you king.
So far, we've seen him unsuccessfully find donkeys, and then hide when they called his name. That's what we know of Saul. He was humble, but he seems humble to the point of not wanting to do this.
I don't know if we would like him. Some people would like that he was tall, might like that he was wealthy, and you might appreciate that he's handsome. But I don't know if we'd pick him as king.
In our country, Kennedy and Nixon have a debate, and Nixon was sweaty and people were like, "Seems real sweaty. Can't elect that guy." He lost. I can tell you it's a big deal because I know about it.
The first election I was able to vote in was Obama, way after Kennedy and Nixon. If Nixon had been hiding in the back under a table, not well, hyperventilating, and they had to start off by saying, "Candidate Nixon is hiding in the back under a table, breathing in a bag, refuses to come out, says that he'd like to speak to his mother," they would have had a tough time. They would ask Senator Kennedy what he thought about that. But Nixon was just sweaty. He glistened too much on TV, and people said, "Can't trust him." People were kind of right.
So there you go. This guy hid. They had to go find him. What makes him special? Why is God blessing and sending valiant men with him? And why are these people called worthless? He didn't win a battle. He didn't accomplish anything. He didn't win a tournament. He wasn't the most anything, really—most tall. I want to show you all what it says.
Verse 24: Samuel said to all the people, "Do you see him whom the Lord has chosen?" Now we know why he's special—the Lord chose him. Therefore, it's worthless to reject him whom the Lord has chosen, and it's a good thing to do to follow him whom the Lord has chosen because he's chosen.
That's what makes him special—God, in his divine choosing, chose him.
But everybody goes home. Saul keeps his peace. We're going to chapter 11.
Then Nahash the Ammonite went up and besieged Jabesh Gilead. We've been hearing about problems with the Philistines on the west. Israel is in the middle. Jabesh Gilead is over here on the east, and the Ammonites are over here. The Ammonites have now besieged Jabesh Gilead on the other side of the Jordan.
Isn't it nice to live where and when we do, where this doesn't happen as often? Historically, this was super common: an army shows up, you're hanging out, suddenly you see people marching, your walled city is surrounded, and they just besiege it. If you have a big enough army, you're ready to go get some stuff.
All the men of Jabesh said to Nahash, "Make a treaty with us and we will serve you." That phrasing is actually "cut a treaty with us," which is how they would cut a covenant. They would cut up an animal, mingle the blood, then walk through. It's officially called a suzerain and vassal covenant, where you have one ruling authority over a vassal state that will pay tribute, taxes.
So they say, "That's a nice besieging army you have there." They send out an envoy and say, "We'll cut a covenant with you and start sending you money. Deal." Nahash says, "Deal." But Nahash the Ammonite said, "On this condition: I will make a treaty with you that I gouge out all your right eyes and thus bring disgrace on all Israel."
They’re not going to cut up an animal; they’re going to cut up you. Line up. I'll pop out all your right eyes and bring shame on all Israel. That'll be the covenant, then you'll owe me taxes.
The elders of Jabesh said, "Give us seven days' respite that we may send messengers through all the territory of Israel. Then if there is no one to save us, we will give ourselves up to you."
That's desperation. What else can they do? They said, "Let us go through all Israel and ask." He says yes, which seems crazy culturally—that he would say yes.
They basically say, "Give us a chance to see if someone wants to come kill you. If they do, thanks for waiting. If they don't, you can gouge our eyes out." It makes some sense because his goal was to bring shame on all Israel.
They said, "Let us go through all Israel and ask." He apparently says yes because next we hear: when the messengers came to Gibeah of Saul, they reported the matter to the people, and all the people wept aloud.
They heard the news; they were heartbroken. This is awful. They seem despondent. What are we going to do?
The people of Israel have been a loose collection of peoples, tribes, and have never really banded together for some things. That's part of the reason Nahash thinks, "Sure, try to get those people together."
Now Saul was coming from the field behind the oxen. He's gone back to work. Saul said, "What is wrong that the people are weeping?" They told him the news about Jabesh.
The spirit of God rushed upon Saul when he heard these words, and his anger was greatly kindled. He took a yoke of oxen, cut them in pieces, and sent them throughout all Israel by messengers, saying, "Whoever does not come out after Saul and Samuel, so shall it be done to his oxen."
Then the dread of the Lord fell upon the people, and they came out as one man.
Imagine someone rides into your town with two-day-old ox pieces, tosses it down, and says, "Hey." Everybody's like, "What are you doing?" He says, "Saul, our king, cut that ox up." He says, "Get your weapons and muster or he's going to cut your oxen."
It's an effective message. The dread of the Lord fell on the people, and they come as one man.
Verse 8: When Saul mustered them at Bezek, the people of Israel were 300,000, and the men of Judah 30,000. They told the messengers, "Say this to Jabesh Gilead: Tomorrow, by the time the sun is hot, you shall have salvation."
Their city's besieged. To get that message in, these people must cross back through. Nahash knows they're going back in; people are returning now with the answer. When the messengers told Jabesh, they were glad.
Verse 10: They said to Nahash, "Tomorrow we will give ourselves up to you and you may do to us whatever seems good to you."
That phrase is fair translation, or, "We'll come out to you. We'll march out." They intentionally tightrope walk—"We'll come on out; you can do whatever you want to."
There's a little eye play on words, too: "We'll let your eyes do what you want to do," which is what they said.
Verse 11: The next day Saul put the people in three companies; they came into the midst of the camp in the morning watch, before sunrise, and struck down the Ammonites until the heat of the day. Those who survived were scattered so no two of them were left together.
Nahash surrounded a city, very confident, then 330,000 Israelites showed up in the middle of the night, and it went very poorly for Nahash.
Verse 12: The people said to Samuel, "Who said Saul shouldn't reign over us? Bring those men so we may put them to death." Those who stood against Saul did it publicly. After Saul showed he can lead, muster, bring rescue, they said, "Who said Saul wasn't going to be in charge? Let's kill them, too."
Those guys are there because they all showed up, and they were like, "No, this turned real quick."
Saul said, "Not a man shall be put to death today, for today the Lord has worked salvation in Israel."
Samuel said to the people, "Come, let us go to Gilgal and renew the kingdom." All the people went to Gilgal; there they made Saul king before the Lord. They sacrificed peace offerings before the Lord, and Saul and the men of Israel rejoiced greatly.
So we've seen Saul anointed, chosen, and now solidify as king.
We've seen bits and pieces of his character. One thing to keep asking: what makes him special? Why is he special? What's worked here to make this good?
Reading the text, God chose him and empowered him. The Spirit of the Lord fell on him, kindled his anger, then Saul acted. The last time we saw him do something good was prophesying when the Spirit fell on him.
He's been chosen and empowered by the Spirit. God hasn't just picked out the best guy—he's picked someone and is empowering them.
I want to take a moment as a church family, as Christians, those following Jesus, to wrap our heads around what Saul has. We have something even better.
What happened for Saul? Something even better has happened for us. So, turn with me to Ephesians 1.
Paul writes to Christians about what it means to belong to the Lord. In verse 3, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places."
That's wonderful. We are blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing.
"He chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before him."
What makes us special? He chose us. What made Saul special? He was chosen.
In the New Testament, he chooses those whom he blesses. We're blessed because he chose us.
"He chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before him." If you belong to Jesus, you are holy and blameless because of Jesus, not you. You're blessed because of his choosing, not you.
He did this before the foundation of the world. If you're a Christian and wonder why you're special, why did I get to believe this, why me? Because he chose. He did this.
When we look at Saul and say, "Why did he choose Saul?" It doesn't tell us why. It tells us some things, but not the reason.
Why did he choose me? It says, "In love." It's not in us; it's in his love.
We were loved in him, so we love him because he first loved us.
"He predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of his will."
He loves us and brings us to himself, which is wonderful. If you belong to Jesus, you don't get in on a technicality like, "Try not to cause problems; you got in because you trusted in Jesus." No.
"In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons." He wants you and me, the church, to belong to him, to be enjoyed, to be delighted in.
Why does he love me? "According to the purpose of his will."
Then it says to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he blessed us in the beloved. Grace is unearned favor—unearned, unmerited, undeserved.
What gets praised? Not anything you've done or accomplished; it's grace, glorious grace.
You say, "I don't feel good enough." It's not about that. He saved you by glorious grace, and he's wonderful.
According to the purpose of his will.
This is beautiful—that it's by his divine choosing.
Imagine being gathered with the people of Israel and the lot falling to you and saying, "What?"
But what we've been chosen for is so much more glorious, wonderful, eternal. It's staggering what he, in his divine purpose and glorious grace, has chosen in the blood.
It keeps going. Ephesians 1:7, "In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time—to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth."
Highlight this: in him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses.
If you're keeping score at home, trespasses are what you brought.
"According to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom," making known the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ, not in you.
He purposed and accomplished it in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him—heaven and earth.
This is about Jesus and God's glorious will.
If you belong to him, it's because he has made you belong to him.
You've been chosen because he's chosen.
You brought sin that made the sacrifice necessary, but you didn't earn, achieve, or keep it. It's not about you.
If they had gathered the people and said, "Hold on. Let's see if he's good at this. Let's watch him a while."
They would all be wrong because God already chose.
If you've trusted Jesus, it's in response to his divine choosing.
You are kept, held, worked on because of him and what he has done.
He has qualified you.
It's about him, not you.
And if you've met yourself, that's great news.
I've had times when I go into a tough conversation prepared, using pep talks, and still fall apart.
It's not about your ability to hold it together or keep it.
It's not about your ability to earn it.
It's about him.
Ok, hold on, sorry.
Verse 11 repeats, but in him we have attained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will.
If chosen, it's because he did this.
So we who first hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.
So he's glorified, praised, exalted.
It's not about you.
You're involved as the object, the recipient.
When you consider your walk with Jesus, you're not the subject or the verb.
God is doing the work, Christ is doing the work.
You're down here being acted on by a glorious God who divinely chooses, rescues, saves, redeems, and keeps according to the purpose of his will, because of his love, because of his glorious grace, and to the praise of his glory.
You shouldn’t think, "I must be one of the good ones."
God didn't pick you because of something special.
You wouldn't conclude you earned or achieved this.
You’d conclude you need to praise his glory.
Why are you a Christian? Because Jesus is wonderful, good; he redeems, saves, and loves.
That would all turn back to praising his glory and grace.
But you say, "Saul falls apart. God chooses, Saul loses it."
Good point.
That's why I said we have something better than Saul.
Saul was chosen for a role in an earthly kingdom.
He was chosen temporarily as a king in a temporary kingdom.
He was empowered by the Spirit for some of what God was going to do, but he ultimately lost it.
We in Christ are not chosen by lot.
We’re chosen by grace.
Not chosen by Samuel through lots, but chosen by Jesus through his blood.
Chosen for an eternal kingdom.
Verse 13: "In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation"—that is, Jesus Christ came, died on the cross, rose again so you might have hope and faith.
That's proclaimed in baptism: Jesus was dead and buried, and with him we die and bury our sin.
Without Jesus, we don't rise, but because Jesus rose, we rise.
We are washed clean, made new, given new life; our sin is dead and buried with Christ, and we rise with him with justification—we're made new and whole.
That's what we celebrate.
The gospel says when you heard it and believed it, believed in him, you said, "It's not about me; it's about him. I don't believe in me; I believe in him."
That's your process, your response.
You were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.
Sealed.
Saul was empowered; we are too.
The New Testament tells us he's empowered us for mission.
But we're not just empowered; we're sealed.
The promised Spirit is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it.
The Spirit will keep you going until you get the full inheritance of all the blessings of Christ.
It's guaranteed; a guarantee is as good as the person who makes it.
And it's the God of the universe.
You're not just empowered; you're sealed, kept, and guaranteed.
Jesus says you're put in his Father's hand, and no one takes anything from the Father's hand.
If that's true for me and my sons, 10 and 7, it's true for God.
If He’s holding something, He’s not letting go.
It's guaranteed.
Sealed by the Spirit, and it’s working.
He says in chapter 4, "Don't grieve the Spirit by whom you were sealed for the Day of Redemption."
You say, "But I'm doing bad stuff, grieving the Spirit, causing problems."
He says, "Yes, don't do that, but you're sealed for the day of redemption."
That's the Spirit you’re grieving—who will be with you the entire time until he brings you to the conclusion of the inheritance, till he gets you where he plans to take you by his purpose.
He ends, "To the praise of his glory."
Oh, that he might be praised, exalted, lifted up.
Do you realize you've been chosen in a lottery far better than being the king of Israel?
If you belong to Jesus, you’ve been chosen by his divine choosing and good pleasure, according to the purpose of his will.
He lavished grace upon you, made you his forever, sealed you with the Spirit, and will bring you to the end.
May we praise him, honor him, follow him, and not grieve the Spirit.
At all points, may we know it is by his glorious grace, accomplished in him, brought about by him, and about him.
At no point say, "But I haven’t done this," or "I haven’t done that."
Have you trusted in him? Then stop talking about you.
Do you believe in him? Or do you believe in yourself?
We say, "No, I believe in him."
Therefore, we are made free; we are brought to the end.
Praise his name.
Let's pray
1 Samuel 9-10
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
My name is Spencer. I'm one of the pastors here. So, we are back in 1 Samuel after taking a break for Holy Week. And I'll be honest with you, it's a lot of text today. So, if you want to grab a Bible, you can follow along with us. The text will also be on the screen, but we got all of chapter nine and half of chapter 10 that we're going to work through.
So, we're picking back up where we left off in chapter 8 when the people of God demanded to have a king. They wanted a king like the nations. And Samuel, who is the judge and the prophet at the time, listens and then listens to the Lord, and the Lord says give them what they want. So that's how chapter 8 ends.
We begin chapter 9 with really the question: who is this king going to be? Who's the first human king of Israel? We're picking up in verse one: "There is a man of Benjamin."
Let me pause there. Benjamin is a tribe. It's one of the 12 tribes of Israel in the promised land. Benjamin was one of the sons of Jacob of Israel, and it's the smallest of the tribes. Think of it like counties in a state. Benjamin is a smaller region with a small population. When they come into the promised land in the book of Numbers — and right now, as a church, we're going through a reading plan that has Old and New Testament readings — so when you read Numbers, you see that Benjamin has smaller numbers, but that gets worse in the book of Judges when they wage war with the other 11 tribes. You can read that story, and what they are defending is indefensible evil. They almost get wiped out because of it.
This is the tribe of Benjamin. When Benjamin was receiving the blessing for his heritage back in Genesis 49, he is called a ravenous wolf. That's language for they're a bit war hungry, scrappy, and small. They have a checkered past — a really checkered past when you read the book of Judges.
So, there was a man of Benjamin whose name was Kish, son of Abel, son of Zeror, son of Beckarath, son of Aphia, a Benjaminite, a man of wealth. He had a son whose name was Saul, a handsome young man. There was not a man among the people of Israel more handsome than he. From his shoulders upward, he was taller than any of the people.
If you're familiar with the Old Testament, you may have heard of Saul. Saul is, as we will see in chapters 9 and 10, the first king of Israel. So, we take note that he's a Benjaminite, interestingly, from a wealthy family — the family of Kish. But most importantly, he stands out because he's handsome, tall — taller than anyone else.
He's kind of like Gaston from Beauty and the Beast of Benjamin. No one as slick or fast or strong as Gaston. This is Saul, and he looks the part.
What follows starting in verse three is the story of how he is chosen. Now, the donkeys of Kish, Saul's father, were lost. Kish said to Saul, "Take one of the young men with you and arise and go and look for the donkeys."
They passed through the hill country of Ephraim and the land of Shallashim but did not find them; they passed through the land of Shaleim but were not there; and they passed through the land of Benjamin but did not find them. So, the donkeys were missing, and this family livelihood was at stake.
Saul and his servant came to the land of Zuf, and Saul said to his servant, "Come, let us go back, lest my father cease to care about the donkeys and become anxious about us." He recognizes that their lives may be more important than donkeys.
But his servant had an idea and said, "Behold, there is a man of God in the city, held in honor; all that he says comes true. Let us go there, perhaps he can tell us the way we should go."
Saul replied, "But if we go, what can we bring the man? For our bread and sacks are gone, and there is no present to bring to the man of God. What do we have?"
The servant answered, "Here have with me a quarter of a shekel of silver, and I will give it to the man of God to tell us our way."
In Israel, when a man went to inquire of God, he said, "Come, let us go to the seer," for what today we call a prophet used to be called a seer.
Saul said to his servant, "Well said, come, let us go." So they went to the city where the man of God was.
On the way up to the city, they met young women coming to draw water and asked them, "Is the seer here?" They answered, "He is. Behold, he is just ahead of you."
The women told them to hurry because the seer had just come to the city for a sacrifice on the high place. Before he eats, he must bless the sacrifice, then those invited will eat. They should go on and meet him immediately.
They went up to the city and saw Samuel coming out toward them on his way up to the high place — not just any seer, not just any prophet, but Samuel. The book is named after him, so this is a big moment.
Before Saul came, the Lord had revealed to Samuel, "Tomorrow about this time, I will send to you a man from Benjamin. You shall anoint him to be prince over my people Israel. He shall save my people from the hand of the Philistines, for I have seen their cry and heard it."
This is not a random coincidence; God is at work, orchestrating ordinary events for extraordinary purposes. So Samuel waits and watches for this man.
When Samuel saw Saul, the Lord told him, "Here is the man of whom I spoke. He shall restrain my people."
Samuel saw Saul arrive, tall and handsome, and God confirmed it was he who would lead the people.
Then Saul approached Samuel at the gate and asked, "Tell me, where is the house of the seer?" Samuel said, "I am the seer."
Samuel invited Saul to eat with him that day, promising to tell him all he had on his mind in the morning. Samuel also reassured Saul about his donkeys—that they had been found, so Saul should not worry.
Samuel then asked, "For whom is all that is desirable in Israel? Is it not for you and your father's house?"
Saul was taken aback by this and said, "Am I not a Benjaminite, from the least of the tribes? And is my clan not the humblest of the clans in Benjamin? Why then have you spoken to me like this?"
Samuel did not answer this question but brought Saul in and gave him a place of honor among about 30 guests.
Samuel instructed the cook to bring the portion he had set aside, the choice leg of the animal, and presented it to Saul. This confirmed Saul's special status.
That night, Saul lay down on the roof to sleep, likely overwhelmed by all that had happened.
At dawn, Samuel called Saul to get up so that he might send him on his way.
As they left the city, Samuel told Saul to tell his servant to pass on ahead and then to stop so Samuel could make known to him the word of God.
Samuel took a flask of oil, poured it on Saul's head, and kissed him saying, "The Lord has anointed you to be prince over his people Israel. You shall reign over the people of the Lord and save them from their surrounding enemies."
There was no doubt now that Saul was chosen and anointed as king. Samuel then gave Saul very specific instructions about events to confirm his kingship.
When Saul left Samuel, he would meet two men by Rachel's tomb in Benjamin who would tell him the donkeys were found and that his father was anxious about him.
From there, Saul would meet three men going to God at Bethel carrying goats, bread, and wine. They would greet him and give him two loaves of bread.
Then, at Gibeah, near a Philistine garrison, Saul would meet a group of prophets coming down from the high place, prophesying and playing instruments.
The Spirit of the Lord would rush upon Saul, and he would prophesy with them and be changed into another man.
Samuel instructed Saul to do whatever his hand found to do because God would be with him.
Samuel told Saul to go down before him to Gilgal and wait seven days for Samuel’s arrival to offer sacrifices and give further instructions.
When Samuel turned to leave, God gave Saul another heart. God was actively changing him to be the leader Israel needed.
All the signs came to pass that day. When Saul came to Gibeah, a group of prophets met him; the Spirit of God came upon him; he prophesied.
Those who had known him previously were astounded and asked, "What has come over the son of Kish? Is Saul among the prophets?" It became a proverb.
When Saul returned home, his uncle asked where he had been, and Saul said he was seeking the donkeys but went to Samuel when they were not found.
Saul’s uncle asked what Samuel said, and Saul told him the donkeys had been found but kept silent about the matter of the kingdom.
And that is where we stop today, picking up next week with Saul's coronation as the first king of Israel and his initial acts as king.
If you read this story for the first time, there is a lot of optimism: God chooses Benjamin, a tribe with a dark past, and Saul looks the part—tall, handsome, a warrior from the wolf tribe.
But when you read the context, it is not an optimistic story. The people of Israel at the end of chapter 8 refused to obey Samuel and demanded a king to be like the nations, rejecting God as their king and leader.
They didn't want God to fight their battles but to have a human king who would. Saul fits this desire perfectly. He looks like the mighty pagan kings surrounding them.
Yet, the story of Saul is a tragedy. He makes many mistakes; his flaws overtake him, leading to a tragic end. He becomes a footnote in the story of David, a cautionary tale of cowardice and vanity.
Though he looks the part, he does not have the heart to be king. Soon, God will reject him and choose David, a man after His own heart.
David, it turns out, was not impressive by worldly standards — not tall or handsome. In fact, when Jesus comes, Isaiah 53 prophesies he will have no form or majesty, no beauty to desire him.
Jesus does not look like the king people want.
Even now, many want a king who will give them prosperity, power, ease, or control, rather than the King who calls us into relationship and obedience.
We want a king who meets our desires on our schedule rather than giving us what we need in His timing.
Some even want no king at all, preferring to be their own kings.
This folly of wanting a king after our own heart instead of God's remains today.
The good news is that God will bring a king after His own heart through David and ultimately through Jesus, the true King who establishes an eternal kingdom.
As we witness the rise and fall of Saul, let's not be arrogant but reflective, seeing ourselves in this story.
Let's recognize how we also want a king we create rather than the King who has already chosen us.
Tomorrow, we'll take the Lord's Supper, remembering the King who gave His body and blood for us.
Christians come humbly to proclaim our need for King Jesus.
If you are not a Christian, come with humility to this King and place your trust in Him.
The table is open for those who know they need Him.
Let me pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray the gospel of the kingdom comes upon our hearts so we see all the ways we reject You as King.
Help us come humbly and joyfully to Your table, worshiping and delighting in You, trusting Your ways, not our own.
If anyone here is not fully trusting in You as King, may You compel their hearts to see You as better.
We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.
Easter 2025
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. Happy Easter! My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. If you will, grab a Bible and go to Romans chapter 4. We're going to consider just a few verses in the book of Romans this morning. We're going to pick up and look at the text that we looked at on Good Friday if you were with us then. We will be in Romans chapter 4, verses 24 and 25, and then we'll look a little bit at chapter 5.
I want to read this: "It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord." We gather on Easter and we're celebrating that Jesus was raised from the dead, that he was dead and then came alive again, that He was crucified, buried, and then resurrected. His disciples, His mother, those who followed Him, the centurion, the religious leaders—they all saw Him die, saw Him buried, and then came back to life.
There's a story recounted in Luke chapter 24 where Jesus's disciples are together and Jesus shows up after He had been crucified and buried. When He appears, His disciples are frightened and think He's a ghost. I've always thought that was funny that it's included in the Bible, but it makes a lot of sense. If you watch someone be brutally murdered and then be buried, and then you're gathered with people to be sad about it, and then they show up, your response isn't "oh!" Your response is "ah!" You immediately think something's wrong with you, your mind is broken, or ghosts are real. You don't jump to maybe there's a resurrection, maybe you've conquered death.
Jesus shows them His hands and feet and says, "I have hands and feet; spirits don't." He's like, "Ghosts don't have feet, but I do because I'm real." And then He eats food. He verifies that He's been resurrected; He was literally dead and then literally rose back to life. We're going to study a text that helps us understand why that's wonderful because if you don't know much about Christianity, you may know that Jesus died and rose, but we want to know why that's wonderful.
There are people in this room who have things they've done or that have happened, and you're like, "It's happened, it's done, it's sealed, it's final, it's official, it's locked in." But if we follow a God who can rise from the grave, then He can undo things that are sealed and locked in. The most final thing we have is death. You don't go see a judge and they're like, "All right, you're going to be executed today and then you better be at work tomorrow." That's not how it works. The most final thing we have is death. If He can undo that, then He can undo the things that we carry with us.
We will see why it's wonderful. It says, "It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses." That's what we looked at on Friday—that He was delivered up for our trespasses, meaning that we have actual debt, actual sin. One pastor says that sin does something; it literally does something in the world, in spiritual reality. He said it's similar to if I came to your house and broke something.
Let’s say you invited me over to watch something on your television. During our enjoyment, I got very frustrated and threw something at it, breaking it. The party is over; your TV is broken, and I have a debt. I have a guess that you like your TV, since you invited me over specifically to watch it. We have a problem: something is broken, and there are only a few options. I can pay the debt, or you can. Those are our options. I can fix what's broken; the cost can come from me, or the cost can come from you. Even if you said, "Don't worry about it," that doesn't fix your TV. You're just saying you'll pay the debt or incur the cost by never watching TV again or getting a new one.
Do you know who can't say "Don't worry about it"? Me. I can't ruin the party and then go, "Wait, don't worry about it, it's not a big deal, let's pretend it never happened." The one person who can't do that is me. I can't bump into you, spill something on your shirt, and go, "Let's just forget this ever happened. Let's move on. It's not a big deal. It's your shirt, it's not mine. Let's just go about our day." I can't do that.
Y'all realize we do that sometimes with people. We'll say, "Well, I don't know why it’s such a big deal. God just needs to, like, why does He care?" That's us breaking the TV and then saying, "Don't worry about it." We can't do that. There's real debt, real trespass, a real cost.
What we're celebrating is that Jesus paid it—that He was delivered up for our trespasses. That's what we talked about on Good Friday, that He paid the debt. Then it says this: that He was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. Not only did He take our debt, but when He rose, He was raised for our justification.
Justification is an intentional legal word. It’s very specific, precise, legally precise language. Now if you don't work in law or contracts, you might not see a lot of legally precise language. I think the place we most run into it is on food labels. For example, if you buy Cheese Whiz or something you spray on stuff, it says "processed cheese food" because it can't just say "cheese" since it's not just cheese. It can't say "processed cheese" because then cheese would be a noun. It says "processed cheese food," where "cheese" is an adjective describing the type of food it is. You're like, "What am I eating?" Scientists say, "Food." You're like, "Yeah, but what do you mean?" They're like, "Well, it's a cheese food." So legally precise language.
If you buy Pringles, it doesn't say chips, it says crisps. What is a crisp? Legally, it’s not a chip. That’s about all I know—it’s legally precise language.
One of the places I appreciated this most was on the show The Biggest Loser. On that show, people try to lose weight. It sounds like they just got them together to make fun of them, but actually they lose weight, and the biggest loser is the winner—it's clever and confusing. My wife and I used to watch it, popcorn and Mountain Dew, and they would do challenges.
In these challenges, to win immunity for the week, they'd have to eat a lot of sweets like Pop-Tarts or cupcakes. The trainers would be mad because they were breaking the spirit of the game. But the funny part was: they weren't allowed to say "Pop-Tarts" because they didn't have the rights, so they had to say "sugar-frosted breakfast pastries." It was like a game of Taboo.
The reason I mention this is that the word "justified" in this text is intentionally precise, legal language. It's wonderful because "justified" means legally not guilty in court, but actually it means better than not guilty. It means declared righteous, ruled in your favor—that you are made righteous, declared righteous, legally not guilty, and you get to walk out free. It's officially accomplished by God in the highest court.
This is beautiful, legally precise language. When He was raised, it was for our justification, meaning that you have been declared righteous, that He took your sin to the cross, and that when He rose, you have been made righteous. The debt has been paid.
It's not just that Jesus says, "Hey, if you come to me I'll forgive your sins, and you need to go live a good life." He doesn't just wipe the slate clean; He signs your name at the top and turns it in. That has been applied to your account.
Periodically, I'll hear Christians say things like, and they're right in one aspect, "I'm a sinner; I have debt." If you come in and say, "I'm a pretty good person," we want to tell you, "No, you're not." If nobody’s been kind enough yet to point out how not wonderful you are, welcome to Mil City Church. No, you're not. We are so thoroughly unimpressed with you. You're a sinner. You have real debt. You have real trespasses. We want you to be aware that you innately sin—that you sin on your own and then, when you know it's sin, you still do it. Once you learn it was wrong, you still do it. You can't just say, "It's okay because you're offended; you caused the offense; you can't declare it’s okay."
So, you're a sinner, but if you belong to Jesus, you are not. You are justified and made righteous. I hear Christians sometimes say, "I'm the worst, I'm just so terrible, I'm always waiting." And I say, "And then Jesus made you righteous?" If you belong to Christ, no, you’re not. You're not guilty—you’re made righteous. Paul calls himself the chief of sinners in the context of declaring he’s received mercy. He says that so everyone else can know if Paul can be forgiven, so can you.
The hope that we have is that He was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification—that we've been made righteous. But there’s a way this happens; it applies this way.
Go back to the beginning of the sentence: It says, "It will be counted to us." What is "it"? It is what Jesus has done, what Jesus has done will be counted to us, accredited to us, put on our account, granted to us, applied to us. It is what Jesus has done.
How will it be counted to us? By belief. That you believe in Christ, believe that God raised Him from the dead, that you believe He paid your debt, that you want it applied to your account. Then it will be applied.
There's a movie called My Cousin Vinny. My wife was out of town, and I was bored, so I watched it again. It's about two young guys from New York going to school in Alabama. They’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, driving the wrong car, and get accused of murder. Because they're from New York, it’s not going well. Then one says, "I’m going to call my cousin Vinny," a lawyer from New York.
Vinny shows up. It’s not going well. There’s tension over whether he’ll represent them. The local guy is worse than Vinny. There's a big moment in court where Vinny says to the local guy, "You’re fired. I want to represent my cousin."
It’s a moment where you can look cosmically at God and say, "I want Jesus to represent me. I want Him to go before me. I want Him to take my debt. I want Him to grant His righteousness to me." And it will be counted if you believe. It will be applied to your account by belief. It will be accomplished not by you but by Him. You trust that His death paid your trespasses and His resurrection justified you before the Lord, declared innocent, righteous, holy, and blameless if you'll just believe. If you'll just look and say, "I want Jesus to pay my debt. I want Jesus to cover me. I trust Him. I believe He’s good. I do not want to represent myself."
That’s what it's saying. It will be counted to us who believe.
So again: "It will be counted to us who believe in Him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification."
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith—we're justified by faith.
That's the legal word again: not by works, not by morality, not by intelligence, not by effort—you’re justified by faith, by trusting Him, not yourself.
And that makes so much sense. What doesn’t work before God is for you to sin, fail, then go to Him and say, "Don't worry. I got this. I’m going to be good enough, pay it off, do so well that you can’t help but respond singing my praises." That doesn't work.
Instead, we come and say, "I trust Jesus. I believe He’s good. I believe He’s righteous. I believe He paid my debt. I want Him to represent me. I want Him to cover me." And we say, "I trust that He’s good."
The Bible says there will be nobody who entrusts themselves to Him who is put to shame. Nobody that calls on Him will be put to shame. Nobody who says, "If He doesn’t cover it, I’m in trouble," will be put to shame. Everyone who comes to Him for mercy will receive mercy.
We are to be justified by faith, so you just believe. You just trust in the finished work of Jesus.
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
You ever been at odds with someone? You can feel it. You've done something, said something, and you're around them and can feel the tension.
It says there is no tension between those who belong to Jesus and the God of the universe.
Every once in a while, I’ll bust into one of my children's rooms. They're little—wouldn’t do this when they’re older, but I do it sometimes just to mess with them. I say, "Aha!" Just to mess with them. It’s fun because often they just look at you like, "What? I was perfectly innocent. I wasn’t doing anything." Other times, the guilt gets to them. They feel like they’ve been caught.
I had a son hide something one time—a toy. He just needed to hide it; it was nothing serious.
The idea is God can look at you and you can just be free. Nothing to worry about, no hint of fear. No "Oh wait." If people announced, "I'm going to come tour your house today," you’d be like, "Hold on. Is it clean? How do I…?" But with God, there’s peace.
We have peace with God through the work of Jesus. We're free.
Some people think Christians are always looking over their shoulders like God’s ready to get them. No. Jesus paid the debt. God’s not mad at you if you belong to Christ, if you’ve trusted Him. He’s not disappointed, upset, or frustrated because the debt has been paid.
Jesus was delivered up for your trespasses. He was raised for your justification.
You’ve been declared innocent, free.
When I was growing up, my dad was self-employed, and sometimes things went well—but other times, it was tight.
My parents would sit my brothers and me down and say, "Money's really tight. If any of you want something, you’re going to be in big trouble." They would say, "You’re going to eat what we give you and be happy about it."
Sometimes, we got to go eat at places with cafeterias. Back then, there was Piccadilly. Let me explain how this works: When you get there, you can see the food, but you can’t access it. The food is in what I call "food prison." There are food wardens who put the food on your plate, and every item you get means debt you’ll pay later.
There were times when we got to go, but beforehand, my dad would say, "Look…" When we got there, he'd tell us what we were allowed. One piece of chicken, two vegetables, some Jell-O. He’d be looking at the cake like, "You know you can’t have that."
We knew the terms in advance, which was good parenting—pre-threaten your children in the truck, then when they try something, just give them the look. Pre-threatening inflates the meaning.
We were supposed to get what we got and be thankful.
Then there were buffets, which were very different. There used to be more buffets—Ryan's, Quincy's, Western Sizzler. We had a place called Fire Mountain. Ryan's had a roll as big as your head.
At a buffet, you pay first and then you’re free. There’s no food warden; you hold the scoop. Nobody protects the food from you. At SNS, you were supposed to get a little and be happy. At a buffet, you’re free.
When my dad took us to buffets, it was so we could hurt ourselves. We were supposed to pile things up, show him, and eat it all—not waste it—try different foods: soft serve, cookies, that weird pink stuff no one liked.
Jesus has been raised for our justification.
Christianity is not the SNS cafeteria; it’s a buffet. I don’t mean license to sin but freedom and joy—a feast.
The debt has been paid. As Christians, we need to repent of sin, mourn the brokenness in the world. But the default mode of the Christian life is joy because Christ is resurrected.
There is no debt; it's all been paid.
We walk with our heads held up, hearts full, rejoicing in the freedom and hope Christ has given, to His glory.
When I piled food on my plate at a buffet, it brought joy to my dad's heart that I appreciated what he had bought.
When we walk as Christians with hope, fellowship, life, joy, and eternity in focus, acknowledging that when we sin, we have propitiation—that Someone stands between us and God—we are not guilty.
We go to Him in grace and forgiveness and say, "It’s never been about me; it’s about You. My trust is in You, the glorious King who saves sinners."
That brings joy and delight to His heart because He already paid the cost.
We walk in freedom.
Galatians says, "It is for freedom that He set us free." I used to read that and wonder, "What does that mean?" It means freedom.
I'm not supposed to think, "I can’t pile two things on my plate at the buffet." I’m supposed to enjoy it, delight, and walk in joy.
That’s what we celebrate at Easter.
If you’ve trusted in Him, you are not dirty, broken, covered in sin.
He was delivered up for your trespasses and raised for your justification.
If He is risen and you've trusted Him, you are free, covered, blameless, and it’s already happened.
We aren’t waiting for the sentence to be dropped. We’re not in court waiting to hear our fate. If you’ve trusted Jesus, the sentence has been passed. He was declared guilty. We have been made righteous.
The band’s coming back up. We’re going to sing.
If you’re a Christian, I remind you Jesus is risen and you are free and made righteous.
If you have not placed your faith in Jesus and plan to represent yourself in court—plan with your own wisdom, morality, goodness, or just declaring, "It's not that big a deal"—I say: Trust Jesus.
Place your faith in Him. Go to the Lord and say, "I want Jesus to cover me. I want Jesus to stand in for me. I want Jesus to pay my debt. When He died, pay my sin. When He rose, give me life."
And it will be counted for those who believe.
Let’s pray.
Jesus, we are thankful for the hope of the resurrection that holds secure through the finished work of Jesus—that all who call on Your name will be saved.
You were delivered up for our sin, raised for our justification, and in You and You alone we have hope.
May Your name be glorified. Amen.
Palm Sunday 2025
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Sermon Transcript
My name is Spencer, I am one of the pastors here. We are taking a break from 1 Samuel to really be in Holy Week this week. We have Palm Sunday today, Good Friday coming up this Friday for our night of worship, and Easter Sunday. So we're going to pause 1 Samuel, and we're actually going to be in John 15 today. If you have a Bible, you can turn there. We'll get there in a moment.
One of the things I try to do with my children is I try to look for teaching moments, to really build their life on the right truth, to build their life on the right words and phrases about who our God is and how that shapes them. And I'm looking for those opportunities when they come. A year and a half ago, my son… we're trying out different activities. He started karate and gave that a run. Now, I didn't do mixed martial arts as a kid, but I was like, "Alright, we'll give this a go." So I'm watching him, and there's this one day where he's just kind of halfway going through the motions. I appreciate his instructor because his instructor didn't play around. He told him, "Just sit down. If you're not going to participate, just sit down." He got back up again, just kind of halfway through the motions. And then I was done. We were done with that. I put him in the car, and we're off to community group.
I'm looking for just this moment to teach him what I've been trying to teach him for a few weeks at this point. I was just like, "Hey listen, buddy…" What I was trying to teach him is the theology of work: the idea that we work unto the Lord, that everything we do, we do to the glory of God. I wanted him to understand that this may seem small, but it's actually a picture of bigger things. Like, you need to actually listen. You need to work hard. You're there for an hour; do the motions, do all the things. I don't really know what to tell him, but I'm sitting there watching him. You pick it up, do the things that you need to do in order to do this well, because we work unto the Lord. And I'm driving, and I can see in the mirror looking back, his eyes are just kind of glazed over. I'm like, "Are you listening?" And then finally I just said, "Hey buddy, why are you doing karate?" I'd set up the moment where he's just like, "I'm doing it to the glory of God, Dad!" Like, I'm waiting for some smaller version of that, that at least captures what we've been talking about. And he was deep in thought. And then he just said, "To protect women."
And I was like… and it dawned on me that when he started karate just a few months before that, that was one of the things that we had talked about. I was like, well, you know, karate, this will give you the opportunity for self-defense and to grow. And I remember that I had said something about… you know, I was trying to teach him that we as men, we're called to protect and take care of women, and that in our household, yeah, you should learn what it takes to, like, if someone's going to come in, to be able to fight them, to be able to put them on the ground. I think I did some version of that. That's what he took away: that karate was to protect women. And I was like, you know what buddy? Honestly, count the W. Like, I mean, just we'll work on the theology of work stuff on other things, but if you have it in your brain that this is how to protect women, like we're getting somewhere. But I said that months ago, I hadn't even thought about it.
But that happens. We take words, we take ideas, and we build our lives upon them. He had built karate on top of this idea that "I will fight for my sisters, I will fight for my mother." And I was like, yeah, that's good. But we do that. That's something that happens as we build our lives upon ideas and truth and words. And today as we look at this passage, we're going to focus on this teaching from Jesus that teaches just that: the importance of words and how they shape us.
You see, on Palm Sunday, what we just celebrated in the songs that we sang and the liturgy that we read, we celebrate that Jesus came into the city celebrated as Hosanna, the Savior King. And then a whole bunch of things happened between him entering into the city and Good Friday. In fact, when you read the Gospels, they slow down a bunch. The gospels cover the three-year ministry of Jesus, but they really slow down at the end. And a lot of it does cover this final week where we get teaching after teaching of Jesus talking about what it means to be one of his followers, what the kingdom of God is like. And John 15 is one of those teachings. It's actually on the night of Passover when he's teaching his disciples. And we're going to see what he is getting at.
Now, we're not going to see it in its entirety. To do this passage justice would take three or four weeks. I mean, there's a lot going on in John 15. We're only going to do 11 verses. And even to do that, it would take some time because there's a lot of really wonderful pictures of God and some good, wonderful theology packed into this. So I'm not going to be able to answer and do all the things. That's actually part of why we have community groups. If you're in our groups this week, you'll be able to discuss this and go a little bit deeper into some of the other areas. But we're really going to focus and zoom in on one idea that comes out of this text. It's the idea of Jesus's word at work in us and how that has profound power to shape us. Because we live in a world that is offering so many different things you can build your life on, so many different phrases and words and ideas that you can build your life upon. But I want us to see so clearly that Jesus has this invitation to build our life on something better, and that matters immensely. So that's just the one thing we're going to pull from this today, and I want us to sit in this and see this so clearly.
So let me pray for us that we'd have hearts to receive this, and then we will move into this. Heavenly Father, I pray that you would give us ears to hear. I pray that we would receive your word and not just be hearers of the word, but be doers. And that comes through believing the gospel. That comes through course-correcting our life, moving away from sin and more towards you. And we can't do that without your power at work within us. So we ask that you would do that. In Jesus' name, Amen.
Alright. So in John 15, just a little bit of context because we're jumping into the Gospel of John. This is a teaching called, in a series of teachings called, the "I am" teachings. And John, as he's telling the story of Christ – and John's really explicit about how he's written this gospel – it is to explain Christ as God and that you should believe in him. And so he's got seven different teachings he's lined up, these "I am" teachings, that Jesus is telling them who he is. He says, "I am the bread of life. I am the light of the world. I am the door. I am the good shepherd. I am the resurrection and the life. I am the way, the truth, and the life." And then we get to this final "I am" teaching here in chapter 15. So I want to read it all in one clip and then we'll work through this.
He says, "‘I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.’"
Man, there's a lot going on there. A lot of wonderful truths. Now, to even begin to understand what he's getting at, we need to understand that he's using a metaphor to teach something greater. He's using the example of a vine to help teach that he is the vine and we are the branches. Now here's the problem: Many of us are not growing vineyards in this area. It's just not happening. And they would have been very familiar with this language, and we are not. So I think it's helpful to actually see what he's talking about. So this is a typical vineyard vine. And what Jesus is getting at here is that he's the main vine that goes across the trellis, and that we are the branches that flow out of this vine. So there's one main vine that's going across, and there's branches flowing out of this.
And there's a lot packed into this. But one of the things he's trying to clearly teach is that his people are in him. We are a part of him. This is something that you read throughout the New Testament. This is what Paul is getting at when he's teaching that Jesus is the head of the church and the church is the body. It's all one. This is where we get teachings about Jesus is the cornerstone, the foundation of our faith that the house is built upon. It's these same ideas that we are in Christ, that when you're a Christian, you are connected to him. And it's a helpful visual to explain what he is getting at.
Now, there also is quite a bit packed into this passage that we don't have time to get into. There's a whole thing on the Father pruning branches, branches thrown into the fire. There's some things on needing to understand being known by spiritual fruit and the importance of that, the importance of the commandments. There's all types of stuff that is going on here. But again, to be able to do this and do this well… I have one option: I could be here for like 60 minutes, which is frowned upon because Kid City has children that have a ticking time bomb. So I'm not going to do that. And I'm not going to stretch this out for three or four weeks. I do think that you'll find some helpful study in this in groups this week. But I do want to focus on this one main idea here: that Jesus, the Word incarnate, this is our God, and we get to abide in him, and we get to be in him and him in us. And I just want us to see this so clearly.
So let's work this going back to the top in verse one when he says, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser." Now, Jesus is teaching his disciples, and his disciples are Jewish, and they would have been familiar with this language of the vine. This is not something that's foreign to them, not just because they have lots of vineyards where they were living, but also this is language that flows out of the Old Testament. When you read the Old Testament, you read Psalm 80, Israel is described as a vine taken out of Egypt and planted in the promised land. Isaiah 5 talks about the people of God being described as a vineyard, as a vine. Jeremiah 2 talks about the people of God being called a choice vine. Ezekiel chapter 15 talks about Jerusalem being a vine. We see this over and over again. So much so that in the 100-200 years before Christ, in what's called the intertestamental period between the last book Malachi being written and the gospels happening and Jesus coming, the period of the Maccabees, this period a few hundred years before Christ, they had coins in that time period that had on the back of them a vine from a vineyard, symbolizing Israel. So they were familiar with this. And this was not neutral, that Jesus just took something that they were unfamiliar with that had no loaded language, no loaded meaning in it. He took something that had meaning and also some meaning that we may not see. If you read those Old Testament passages, when it usually talks about Israel as a vine, the people of God as a vine, it speaks negatively. Calls them a wild vine, a useless vine, pictures of disobedience and deserving judgment. So this is not a neutral example that they've been given. But what Jesus is doing is he's taking something that is familiar to them and he's redefining it. He's helping them see this in a different way. And he says, "I am the true vine. I am the vine." And then he says, "My Father is the vinedresser." This is the farmer. This is the gardener, is the one who tends to the vine.
And then he continues in verse two. He says, "Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit." Verse three: "Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you." So there's a lot that he's… I mean, again, if you read the Gospel of John, you see so many of these themes that are connecting together. But John 1 begins with Jesus being declared as the Word who became flesh, the incarnate Word. This is the idea that as God created the world through the power of his spoken word, this God is the Word who became flesh. And this Jesus, this Word, goes to work in his disciples, bringing them to faith. And then they are called, we'll see this later, to live by his words, by his teachings. So we got both pictures here: Jesus the Word who saves and sets apart his people, and the words that he's given for his people to live by, the teachings of the gospel. So he's telling this to his disciples, and it's to 11 disciples, minus Judas. You see, at this point in the Passover meal, Judas has already left. So it's just the 11 that he's talking to when he looks at them, and this is supposed to be unbelievably encouraging, and he says, "You are clean." He looks at 11 men that he's invested three years of his life in, teaching them the kingdom of God and the gospel, helping them see who he is over and over again. And this is the Word that is going to work in their heart to bring them to faith, to be the people of God that he builds the church through, so the people of God may abide in him. He says, "You are clean." This is the power of the word, the power of the word to save us through faith, to set us apart, to make us clean, and to live out his teachings.
But I want us to pause and don't miss this point: That means that the word is powerful. That words in general are powerful. Like, we undersell so often how important it is. We unknowingly build our lives upon words and phrases. We just got done about a month ago with our recovery cycle. Recovery is a 10-week program that we do every year. It's offered for those who are working through any bit of suffering or sin or brokenness. And every year I get to watch, I get a front row seat as a pastor to watch God change people and help them see that they've built their lives upon the wrong words in ways they don't even realize. Because this is what we do. I mean, it's not uncommon in recovery to have someone that remembers a time where their parent years ago said, "Why can't you be as good as this sibling?" And that phrase took root in their heart. And they spent the next 10, 20, 30, 40 years working and striving and proving themselves with an unending work ethic, trying to please others, trying to be the best because years ago they built their life on this idea that they heard so long ago. It's not uncommon in recovery for someone who's been bullied in school growing up or in the workplace to finally make a decision: "That's not going to happen again." That they're no longer going to be in a position where someone overpowers them. They will be in the seat of power. And they build their life upon that idea where everything becomes a power dynamic, and it's beginning to crush their soul. There are positive things we build upon in the wrong ways. It's not uncommon in recovery to hear someone that heard some version of "You're so pretty," "You're so smart," "You're so strong," "You're so dependable" for so long that it went to their head. And instead of that being a place where they turned over thanks to the Lord, it became a place of pride or a place of identity. And the rest of their days has been spent trying to live up to this expectation where "I have to stay the prettiest or the strongest or the smartest or the most dependable." And it's exhausting. And I so love recovery because I get to watch people discover this and then encounter the gospel and a word that is better, that changes them to where they're no longer living under this identity, but they've been given a new one.
But that helps us, I hope that helps us see, that is how powerful words are. And the power of the gospel is immense to change our lives and become a foundation that shapes us. 1 Peter 1:23 says, "since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God." What he is preaching there is that we, through the word of God, are born again. It comes to live in us, and God implants this imperishable seed, this seed that will never die, spoil, or fade. It begins to grow in us, and it changes us through the living and abiding word of God. This is the power of the word, and it's the power of the word at work in us.
And that's something that we should have front and center in our souls, that we should remember how powerful the gospel is. And that's what we celebrate this week, y'all. We just sang songs that celebrated "open wide the gates" and that Jesus comes into the city. We celebrate that he, on Good Friday, as we'll sing so much about on Friday, goes to the cross to pay the penalty for our sin and to absorb the wrath of God that we deserve. That as Romans 6 says, "For the wages of sin is death." The good news of the gospel is that we have sinned against a holy and perfect God, but Jesus lovingly goes to the cross to pay that penalty for us. And the next Sunday, we will celebrate that he walks out of the tomb and makes a way for a new life in Christ, for us to be born again through the imperishable seed that gets implanted in us, that brings us to life. And then we celebrate that Jesus ascends to the right hand of God the Father, where he rules and reigns as King and Lord. So that we look at Jesus not just as Savior, not just as conqueror of death, but as the Lord who says "do this," and we do it; "don't do this," and we don't do it; "be obedient here," and we say, "Yes, Lord." This is the gospel that saves us and sets us apart. That's the power of the word at work in his people that saves us.
But also, I don't want us to miss this: it's a continual invitation to us as Christians to abide. Because in verse four he says, "Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing." So Jesus looks at his disciples and he tells them, "Abide in me." Which means to remain, to stay. Abide in me. It's an invitation, but also it's an encouragement because what does he say? "Abide in me, and I in you." That it isn't this effort and toil to just try to stay connected to him; He's at work within us. Which, y'all, makes him the main character here. He's the vine. He is the vine. He says, "Apart from me you can do nothing. A branch apart from me cannot bear fruit. It withers and it dies." He says, "I am the vine. I'm the one that gives life to the branches. I'm the one that sustains the branches. I'm the one that gives you the fruit. It is me at work within you." And the disciples need to hear this. And y'all, we so deeply need to hear this as Christians. We so deeply need to believe this.
Because so many of us are so deeply trying to be vines when he's called us to be branches. We may not say that, but our actions display this: that we want to be the vine. And my question is, are you tired? If you're honest, are you tired of trying to be the vine? It's not the way it's supposed to be. Matt Freeman, our pastor who oversees worship and other things, he's getting ready to take a sabbatical. He's going to be gone for three months, which I'm excited about for him. I'm excited about for him because this is going to be good for his soul. Um, I got to do a sabbatical last year, and I needed it. Um, I needed the time to rest and and to do some soul work. I'm thankful as a church that we get to do these sabbaticals. I'm thankful that we have the time and space and we have the team that can be able to do this. But I needed this because I've realized that so much of my pastoral ministry and my life as a Christian is this endless attempt to be the vine, and it just shows up over and over again. And that's no way to live. And as a pastor, that's an easy way to burn out. I mean, pastoring is a joy, and I love it, and it's wonderful. I wouldn't want to do anything else. But it is hard. There's a spiritual weight to it. And the burnout rate in pastoral ministry is high. I mean, it's high. There's a whole cottage industry devoted right now to trying to understand all the different factors for why pastors are burning out, why they don't last longer than five years. And it's, you know, there's a lot that's going on there. And like many things, these problems are multifaceted, multifactorial. There's a lot of things going on. And there's also trying to figure out how to inspire people to jump into pastoral ministry because there's fewer people jumping into pastoral ministry. So they're all trying to figure this out. But I know one of the factors good and well of this type of burnout is self-inflicted. It is forgetting that you're not the vine, that you're a branch. And my sabbatical taught me that so much, that so much of my effort is from me. And I had to grow in prayerfulness. There was an immense lack of prayerfulness in my life. And I've had to learn to just, when I'm feeling burdened, to just go outside and just walk down Holland Avenue in the sun and see the invisible attributes of God and his glory of his creation and just talk to God and just pray and cast my cares upon him to sustain me. Like, I need this. Well, you need this. Like, as a Christian, you need this.
You need to read the scriptures, not just for the utility of checking a box or doing a thing or completing a task or what, but to actually just gaze upon the beauty of our God and his word. We need this. We need this because we're so trying to be vines, and we're not. We're not capable of it. We're not designed to be the vine. We're not designed to be the source of life, of strength, of identity. No, it comes from him. And there's this invitation to abide in him. And we just miss it, y'all. We miss it. So many of us are trying. So many of us, our Christian faith is like a phone. It's like a phone where it's just going. It's got all... like my wife, when she for a long time she didn't realize that on the iPhone you have to like close out the windows. And then one day I was like, she's like, "My battery keeps dying." I was like, "Let me see it. Have you closed out your windows?" And she's like, "What?" I was like, "You've had a hundred windows going for years! Like, you got to like get rid of these." And so many of us have so many windows open all the time. We're so many things that are happening all the time. And, you know, we'll switch to low power mode and try to stretch the life out of it, and all of a sudden it starts shutting down. And the problem is that it's meant to be connected to the source of power. It's got to be recharged. You can't endlessly use the phone and expect that it's going to function like it's supposed to.
And that's us. We just, we miss this, y'all. We try to work jobs and raise children and pay rent and be good friends and family and clean up our house and be good neighbors and stay healthy and pay debt and be a better spouse. We try to do all the things without ever charging the battery. And we wonder why we are anxious and depressed and sleepless and overmedicated and overstimulated and overwhelmed. And it is because we have underwhelmed our souls by trying to be the vine when he's just saying, "Be a branch." Just be a branch. And we reject this offer to abide in the vine. And we as Christians live lives a million miles a minute. And then when we have the time to truly abide, we will doom scroll and we will distract. And there's this invitation from our Savior that's saying, "Would you abide in me? Would you abide in me?" And we wonder why our faith is so bland and God seems so foreign and our worship seems so boring. And it's because we live lives trying to be vines instead of branches. The power to live the life we're called to live flows from him. It does not flow from ourselves. And some of us, myself included, need to be so deeply confronted by that reality this morning.
And then Jesus continues in verse six. He says, "If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you." So he says, "If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, it'll be done for you." Which is a wonderful invitation that has been so deeply hijacked and marred by prosperity preachers in America, who have just tried to actively ruin that passage every chance they can. As if that's some invitation to fill the desires of your heart. As if that's not connected to the immediate context, what Jesus just taught in John 14. In John 14 he says, "Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in my name, I will do it." So he just taught that, and he's teaching it again. It's this idea of we ask for things in the name of the Lord, in his name, that his will would be done to his glory and not the exaltation of self. And there's a lot of prosperity preachers in America that took that and made that about our own selfish enriched desires, and they've ruined that. And hell is hot, and they're going to see it one day because that is a wicked way to twist this passage. Because what's so beautiful about this passage is to have such a sweet communion with God, to so deeply abide in him and him in you, that he so shaped your desires to be so heavenly and kingdom-motivated, that what flows out of your heart in this deep abiding relationship is things that make much of him, in his name, to his glory, and not our own. And that is a way to live. That is an invitation to a much sweeter, much better life when we live inside the vine.
And then he, we'll finish here in verses 8 through 11. Says, "By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full." Now goodness, there's a lot in that passage, which again, if you're not part of a group, stop by our connect table today, jump in a group. You could study this this week in your group. So I can't get into all of this. But I do want to end on this idea here, that following the ways of God – and that's keeping his commandments – that following the ways of God is abiding in his love, and that's where joy is found. Like, y'all, we need that so deeply. Our souls need that so deeply. Because our instincts from the flesh, when God says "do this," "don't do this," our instincts say, "Ah, did you say that? Ah, is... I don't know." We don't want to do this. But what he's trying to help us see is that if you're abiding in me, if you're abiding in my love, you'll see this is where joy is found. And maybe against your instincts, but it's better for you because you'll actually discover something that is better.
When my wife and I got married, we had a few different interests. I love sports, I still do. She was a musical theater minor. And to this day, she teaches dance and musical theater for a middle school. So she loves musical theater. And I, when we got married, did not like musical theater. I wasn't raised on it. I saw Oklahoma one time as a kid, and I was like, "That's a glimpse of hell." This is like, I don't love this. But she does. And so I had to finally start to see things from her perspective. And the first musical that finally started to make sense to me is I listened to Les Mis and I saw Les Mis, and I went, huh. I love stories. I love good film. I love music. Okay, I see. And I started to… and then my buddy texted me and said, "Hey, have you heard about this Broadway that just hit called Hamilton?" And I just was like, "No." It's like, I went on Spotify and I listened to it. I went, "Oh my goodness." And then we started going to see Broadways together. We started going up to Charlotte and then, you know, Colombia, and just we started seeing these things. It's like, "Oh, okay." Like, I'm starting to get some of this. And there's some that I truly have begun to enjoy. There's some I still don't enjoy, and I say, "You should go see that with your friend." But there are others where I'm just like, "No, this is a wonderful story. I'm captured by it. I'm captured by the music. I see what they're doing in the first act, how they pull this into the second act. I see this. And now I see how good this is." Now, it was against my instincts; would have never thought I'd be a person that would show up to a Broadway and enjoy it. But I see how some of them, there's a lot of joy in this, and there's joy with her and enjoying this together.
And it may be against our instincts to see the commands of God that we don't want to follow. But if you in faith will trust the vine and trust what he is saying, that this is where joy is actually found. If you do this, you will experience true joy, not the fleeting happiness of this world. Because the world offers us so many things that we can chase after that we think are good, and those things will never satisfy. We have to believe this. We have to believe this wholeheartedly.
A couple days ago, I got to do something that I have so wanted to do for so very long. I got to go to the Masters, which has been a bucket list thing for me to do. Like, I just, I've so badly wanted to go, and I finally got to go. And I got there, and it was awesome. This is probably going to show up in 10 sermon illustrations in the next couple of years because it just was a profound experience for me. But I know some of you don't like golf. It's fine. But stay with me. I was there, and I was enjoying it. I was enjoying all the things that I've wanted to enjoy for years. But I also realized there's a crowd that shows up to the Masters, it's a little different. I thought that, you know, everyone's going to be there and they're going to be enjoying this the whole way to the finish. And by the time we're at 18, the final hole in golf – there's 18 holes – on the final hole, we're there, which is a big deal as you see them finish in the biggest golf tournament in the world, but stay with me. We're there, and there's only like three or four hundred people still left. Like, there just, that's it. I was like, "What in the world? There were thousands of people here earlier, and we're on the final hole of the biggest golf tournament in the world." And what I realized is, is for a lot of people, this is just a social thing. This is a thing. And there's a… I went up to where all the fancy houses are, and I saw all the fancy beautiful people and all the things. And I just had a moment of clarity, not from a position of self-righteousness, but just from a position of just God-given clarity. That's like, there's so many people that want to be in those houses. There's so many people where that's the good life, that that's everything the world offers: money, status, fame, luxuries, riches, all of it. Everything is aimed at that life right there. To be able to do this, it's just a social thing that you do for a minute and go on to the next big thing. And I had such clarity to go, "That's not joyful. That is fleeting worldly happiness. And it's not where joy is found."
And we have to examine our souls to realize where true joy is found. It is found in living a life that abides in the vine. It is found in joyously listening to our Savior and living a life that is pleasing in his sight because that's where ultimate joy is found. And y'all, that invitation is so clearly given to us as the people of God. But we have to have the ears to hear it, and we have to have the eyes to see it. And that's my hope. There are some of you that if you're honest, you've been looking for joy in all the wrong places. That so much of your life has been filled with, "If I can just get to this point in life, if I can just get this, if I can just obtain this, I'll finally be happy." And Jesus so clearly is saying that's not where joy is found. But there is an invitation to you, there is, to come and abide in Christ and have him abide in you, and to live a life connected as a branch to the vine. And my hope is this: in this Holy Week, as we walk through this into Good Friday and we celebrate what he did at the cross, as we walk into Easter and celebrate the empty tomb, that you would have your eyes open to what this invitation is. And you take it, and you'd believe.
And there are those of us that have truly tasted and seen that the Lord is good, that we actually are Christians, we love Christ. But what you need to hear this morning is that some of you have so strived and worked and labored like a vine. And my hope this morning is that you'd hear the invitation so clearly to abide, that you'd see that you are a wonderful branch that God is pruning and doing stuff with. He's trying to bear fruit in. But things need to shift in your life. My hope is that in a group this week, you begin to see that even more clearly, that things need to shift in your life to be a Christian that actually takes the invitation to abide and remembers that you're a branch and he's the vine. Let me pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray that you would help us see this invitation this morning. God, help us see that you are the source of life and hope and joy and fulfillment and identity. It's you. God, I pray that you'd compel our hearts to believe that. There are those here that have never truly believed that. That has not been their story. They've lived life trying to find joy everywhere else. And God, I pray that you pierce through their heart right now to help them see where true actual joy is found. It is found in you. And there are many of us, God, that we've believed that, we've forgotten it. And we've lived lives trying to be branches. And God, may you pierce through our hearts this morning to help us see who we are actually called to be. And that we begin and remember and rediscover what it means to be a branch connected to you, our wonderful vine. In Jesus' name, Amen.
1 Samuel 8
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
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.
Revelation 22:6-22
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 your Bibles go to Revelation chap 22 it is the last chapter in the Bible so we are finishing up the Book of Revelation today we are in the uh what is some people call the prologue or the conclusion of the Book of Revelation and also it's it's the final word in the Revelation of God to us it's the last thing that was given spoken to to the Church and so we get to.
See God's kind of end to the Scriptures as we look at this together today when we when we started the Book of Revelation we tried to explain kind of in general what we were looking at and I want to show you kind of how we broke it down when we began we said that this is an apocalyptic book apocalyptic being the um genre of writing so there's history there's narrative there are the gospels there is prophetic works and and apocal alpic is specifically a revealing that's what apocalypse means and that's why we in English it's called Revelation it's a revealing it's.
God pulling back the curtain and showing us what's really going on and that's this book is an apocalyptic book and a letter written to A persecuted people so it was written at a specific time to a specific group of people to these churches in Asia Minor in the first century who were in the middle of being persecuted in the middle of hardship in the middle of difficulty under attack telling them to endure because Jesus is coming and as this book letter is finished and as it's concluding we're going to.
See today that it ends on the note of reminding them Jesus is coming he will return he's on his way his return is imminent that's the way this book ends that's the reminder for the Church in the middle of difficulty in this book we the beginning of the book is it we call the intro or the uh the prologue which is where we find out that John's receiving a Revelation that he's receiving this Vision that he's going to write it down he's supposed to write what he sees.
Then we go into two to three chapters 2 and three are the letters to the churches and then in chapter four he's taken to the throne room then we see uh the the Seven Seals and the Seven trumpets and then there's this kind of Crescendo section in the Middle where it really in Jewish writing was the the main point and that's these signs in heaven that are seen where multiple times during that the it pauses looks at the audience and says this is a call to endure this is a call to the endurance and the faithfulness of the Saints.
And then we saw the the bows and then Jesus's return and Triumph and judgment and now we're in the conclusion the epilogue the the last words of this that's where we are today we're going to pray and then we're going to jump into the text Lord our hearts are dull our ears are heart of hearing we ask for your spirit to help us so that as we read and consider your return May that awaken in us the appropriate amount of fear the appropriate amount of Joy the appropriate amount of Hope as we long.
For you to set things right we ask this in Jesus name amen Revelation 22: 6 and he said to me these words are trustworthy and true and the Lord the God of the spirits of the prophets has sent his Angel to show his servants what must soon take place that he that said it is likely the angel from the beginning of the book of Revelation it could also be the angel that was most recently speaking to John which is one of the Seven Angels who had one of the seven bowls it is not.
Jesus but he's going to quote Jesus and that's going to be important a little later on as we're going through this text but this is an angel for declaring this message and he says that his words are trustworthy and true and the the Lord the God of the spirit of the prophets has sent his Angel to show his servants what must must soon take place and that um is basically how the Book of Revelation starts that this Angel has been sent to show his servants what must soon take place that this is going to happen and this was in the be the very end of the.
First century when John was exiled on Patmos and saw and wrote this Vision verse 7even and behold I am coming soon blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book so that I is Christ it's Jesus is coming soon blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book that we are to be people who hold to the truth of the Book of Revelation and there's going to be several places in this uh chapter that we're going to.
Look at today where it's going to refer to some specific promises around the The Book of Revelation but it also is uh as Christians we just kind of understand that this applies specifically to the Book of Revelation but it also applies in general to the Scriptures that we're to be people who hold and keep to the word that we're to be people who know our Bibles and encourage one another with Scripture who point one another to Scripture who seek together to study it one of the things I'll do sometimes.
When our group meets is I'll say we study this because we believe it sits above us our goal as a community group is not to discuss what we like and don't like here if you want to confess that you don't like something confess it that's fine Now obey it you can dislike it you're a sinner there's going to be parts of the Bible you don't like it's not something you wrote it's something he wrote it's obviously going to contradict you in some places nobody's ever read the Bible and been like exactly that's what I've been saying all along no there are places here where it grades against us it it works against us it rubs.
Us and we're supposed to fall in line but this is something that we're to be people who love the Bible who love these words and who keep it and hold to it and specifically in the Book of Revelation we are to be people who hold to the coming Rescue of the king that when he peeled everything back he said you see all this chaos you see all this evil you see all that's going on endure endure endure because there's a king who wields a sword and he's on his way.
So we're to be people who keep to this verse eight I John and one who heard and saw these things and when I heard and saw them I fell down to worship at the feet of the Angel who showed them to me but he said to me you must not do that I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets and with those who keep the words of this book worship God okay this is is where it's important that this is an angel speaking the words of Christ uh the Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses don't hold that we should worship Christ as.
God that he's not a deity that he's not God himself he is obviously worshiped in the Book of Revelation we just read together where we are to sing to the lamb where the whole earth spoke blessing and glory and honor and power and might and wealth like all belong to the lamb so there's obvious places where Christ is worshiped and here we have Angel speaking it gets confusing because we don't get to see it but it's clear that we have an angel speaking this as a Herald to John and he's going to quote Christ later he's going to say I.
Jesus but he's quoting so if we were in medieval London and a Herold walked in and blew a trumpet everybody stopped they un unfurled a document and said he ye by order I King Humphrey the second we wouldn't go that's not King Humphrey that's a child in the king old you're obviously a liar we would understand he's speaking on behalf of the king that's what's happening here that this Angel is proclaiming on behalf of Christ declaring this message that's what we have here and what he's saying is that John as he takes all this in just Falls before the angel in worship and the angel immediately is like stop that don't do that which is.
One of the ways that you know Christ he he accepts worship because he's God there are people who fall before him on Earth in the gospels and he allows it but Angels who are demonic accept worship but those who are worshiping God follow God don't that's one of the things you'll see someone them fall down before him they go no no no no get up no no no no no no no no no you don't worship me and I love that that's included John writing this was like.
And then I tried to worship the angel and I got fussed that like if you've been reading the book of Revelation you're like this is a lot think how John felt like he he's overwhelmed at the end of this he just Falls and I think it's in honor of what he's seen and in honor but the angel says no no no no no let's you worship God I'm with you and with you and your brothers We Worship the Lord together and we are to worship.
God and God Alone which if Christ accepts worship that means he is God and we worship Him verse 10 and he said to me do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book for the time is near now one of the beautiful things about thist Scriptures is that it is clear it's clear but it's deep or if you think about it like maybe a an excellent painting or the Cy Chapel or something where it's it's obvious but it's intricate what I mean by that is.
When we look at the Scriptures some people will act like Scriptures has all this hidden meaning you got to really dig to the bottom and only the people who know this secret they they know the truth but everybody else is no the Bible is clear Jesus Christ has come to rescue us from our sin God made the world good we rebelled we cannot on our own save ourselves Jesus came because God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever would believe in him would not perish.
But have eternal life it's clear our hope is in Christ and Christ Alone in the work that he's done on the cross we're saved by faith alone not through works like these things are clear in the Scriptures but it's deep it's intricate there's a lot of places where it weaves in on itself where it shows the intricacies and one of the things I've thoroughly enjoyed in the Book of Revelation is seeing where it tags back and references and parallels Old Testament passages that give depth not not added Clarity it's not like it's confusing without it.
But it gives depth to it it adds richness to it and this is one of those places where as I was studying this I got very excited to see an added layer of depth here so when he says do not see seal up the words of this book we're just like okay but I think John would have gotten cold chills because that's a reference to the interaction with the Prophet Daniel which is the largest Old Testament apocalyptic book and there's a lot of parallels between the Book of Revelation and Daniel I want to show you this in Daniel chapter 12 Daniel has seen all this Vision he's heard all this stuff he's written it down.
He asked a question and they answer it he asked a question about timeline and they answer it and I love what Daniel writes I heard but I did not understand he asked the question and they answer and he goes H and then he just writes down well I heard what he said but I sure don't know what it meant I wrote it down for you but don't ask me because I don't know what he meant and then he says then I said oh my.
Lord what shall be the outcome of these things so he follows up he has another question and he said go your way Daniel for the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end so he looks at Daniel Daniel's asking questions about this and he goes seal it we're not there yet and then John sees all this and he says don't seal it we're there if you watched the Marvel movies and Doctor Strange is dying and he looks over and says we're in the end game.
Now that's what's happening here where John is being told we're here you know what what we weren't ready for before when Daniel wrote Daniel was looking ahead but you see Daniel was looking at the first coming of Christ and the second coming of Christ and he was looking at history as it had to play out and some of the things weren't going to happen until Jesus came the first time until Jesus died until Jesus rose until he had accomplished his Earthly task of being the suffering servant that's all happened John's looking and they just said yeah we're it's happened.
Now this is why the book of Hebrews is going to say things like we're in the last days second Peter is going to say that first Peter is going to say the end of all things is at hand 1 Corinthians 10 the end of the ages has come they they understood that the work that had to happen through Christ had happened and now we're in the end times so if anybody ever ask you when do you think the end times will be.
Now you should look around first though and make it more you know suspenseful you don't but it's it's been that's that's what's happened this isn't sealed this can happen you know there there it just waiting on the imminent return of Christ you know how when you would get mad at somebody and You' say ain't nothing between me and you except for air and opportunity you know what I'm talking about that that's the situation we're in where it's all on his timing.
Now we're not waiting for the further fulfillment he can unroll it as as quickly as he wants he can return whenever he wants it's imminent and then uh Daniel says and this is just a further connection many shall purify themselves and make themselves white and be refined but the wicked shall act wickedly and none of the wicked shall understand but those who are wise shall understand and this is what happens here he says don't seal it which parallels with Daniel.
Then he immediately goes into the same idea of the pure and the wicked he says let the evildoer still do evil and the filthy still be filthy and the righteous still do right and the holy still be holy behold I am coming soon bringing my recompense with me that's repayment bringing what is owed bringing my recompense with me to repay each one for what he has done I am the Alpha and the Omega the first and the last the beginning and the end.
So this is Christ saying the same things that he who was Seated on the throne God the father said it's the Alpha and the Omega the beginning and the end Jesus says that's me and I'm bringing judgment I'm returning to repay each for what they have done and there's this statement in there that is let evildoers still do evil and the filthy still be filthy and the righteous still do right and the holy still be holy and I think part of that is just a declaration that that stuff's going to continue you until he returns that there's still going to be goodness righteousness Holiness those things aren't going to it's not going to disappear.
But there's still going to be evil and filthiness that's not going to disappear either so for the person who says everything's going to fall completely apart and there'll be nobody faithful no no no there'll still be people faithful and for the person who goes we're going to usher in and everything's going to be perfect and wonderful and beautiful no there's still going to be evil and filthiness those things are going to continue but I also think some of what is happening here is that it's it's a genuine.
See there's a there's a problem because you're you're listening to it and you're going okay have the righteous still do right and the holy still be holy fills genuine like that's what he would want but for him to say let the evil do or still do evil and the filthy still be filthy it's like what what part of I mean one of the main things of this book is a call to repentance so what's being said there but I think when he says I'm coming soon bringing my recompense with me it feels like a.
Father who's saying the phrase keep it up meaning that if you're doing right keep it up the words mean what they mean keep it up keep going keep laboring keep fighting for what is good but if you're not doing what you're supposed to and your dad says to you keep it it up he does not mean that my dad didn't use the phrase keep it up he just said all right that's all he'd say all right you knew that meant keep it up find out you want to.
See what I'm capable of you can find out real quick that's what that meant so if he was on the phone and we were making noise he opened the door and told us keep it up and close the door we didn't go I guess he wants us to be loud I don't know we knew it meant and I think that's some of what is being said here when he's saying continue in what you're in I'm coming bringing repayment with me and y'all that's wonderful and that's terrifying it's wonderful.
For those who are in Christ he sees he sees your labor he sees your effort you know how you you sin then you confess sin and there's part of you that thinks confession made it worse even though confession was the part of getting rid of it but it just feels worse but he sees that faithfulness as you give away money as you give away time as all the salesmen that are on your sales floor lie through their teeth constantly you say things like I don't know I'll find out.
For you and your sales are worse because of your honesty he sees it he knows it this is how this works following Christ there are times where things we could cut Corners we could make shortcuts we could do things and he says no let still do be holy still P pursue Holiness still fight against sin still repent still do what's right even when it's hard he sees it and he he repa and it's also a promise for those who are in Christ that they don't get away with it that those who have gotten away with it here harm someone use their power.
For evil use their influence to completely malign to sideline to put somebody in a bad position to whole whole classes and types of people who have worked in their way to give themselves more while they give everybody else less those sort of things where you're looking and going what is going on is there not Justice does he not see and there's this moment here where it's Christ is almost you can feel his hand tighten around the sword and he says I.
See behold I'm coming and that's terrifying if you don't know him and if when he returns he is not your welcomed savior Just Your Righteous judge this is one of the things that I will remind people periodically when we're walking through counseling we're studying the Scriptures together sometimes it seems like they think it's them versus me and I'm I'm just you have a lord I have a lord who is coming to repay and that's wonderful and that's terrible so may we live in light of that truth trusting in the goodness that he is the beginning and the end the.
First and the last the judge of all things we say this all the time we say this on Sundays we say as we're leaving we know that judgment is coming another way to say that is we know that the judge is coming verse 14 blessed are those who wash their robes so that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates outside are the dogs and Sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolators and everyone who loves loves and practices falsehood outside means not in the city it doesn't mean on the road to the city trying to get in it just means they're.
Not here it's it's a way of saying Lake of Fire outer Darkness some of the things that we've seen throughout the Book of Revelation and throughout the Scriptures they're they're not here they don't belong but it says blessed verse 14 blessed are those who wash their robes so that they may have the right to the Tree of Life life and that they may enter the city by the gates y we lost the Tree of Life the tree of life was in the garden.
And when they sin and rebel specifically God says there has to be an angel placed at the Garden and a flaming sword in case they try to come back because they no longer have access to the tree of life that if they tried to get the tree of life it was going to go very poorly for them very quickly and that's been all of humanity has had no right to the tree of life until Christ paid the debt of our sin and in the new heavens and the new Earth we get to walk you sinful you br busted broken you perfectly known perfectly washed perfectly clean get to walk through the gates welcome and get.
To go to the tree of life and eat you have the right to it it's a beautiful promise uh if you want to do a study on it at some point there are seven blessings in the Book of Revelation this is the final one seven times where it says blessed are those this is the final one and it says blessed are those who wash their robes so that they may have the right to the tree of life now one of the questions you should ask is how do you wash your robes does that mean he just said he's coming and he's going to repay.
So the immediate thought would be I better get it together but that's not in the Book of Revelation how you wash your robes it's Revelation 7 he sees all these people with white robes he says who are these clothed in white robes and from where have they come the angel says to him these are the ones coming out of the Great Tribulation they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb you wash your robes in the work of Christ in his Holiness not yours you are made clean by his righteousness which means that all those who've come to.
Jesus and said I'm dirty unless you wash me he's washed every time you've sinned and you've thought I'm so guilty I deserve to be punished that's true the washing is done with blood but by God's grace and mercy and Glory it's done by the blood of Christ not by us so that the payment is made so that when he returns turns and gives to those according to what they have done he does not repay those in Christ for their sin he repays them.
For everything they've done that was good he returns and we only get good things it's wonderful that's the Hope here that those who have trusted in him are washed are welcome through the work of Christ and that when he returns the repayment is only blessed blessing verse 16 I Jesus have sent my angel to testify to you about these things for the churches I'm the root and the descendant of David the Bright Morning Star so Jesus sent the angel to Proclaim these things to the churches to bless the churches to encourage the churches to call them to endure.
And then he says I'm the root and descendant of David the Bright Morning Star meaning that he is the Messiah the promised one who was to come the Fulfillment of the the line of David the Bright Morning Star is a reference to numbers which is a prophecy of one who's going to come and who's going to conquer and who's going to rescue this hope of the Messiah Jesus says that's me verse 17 the spirit the Holy Spirit and the bride that's the Church say come and let the one who hears say come that's that come is to Christ the spirit and the Church are saying come.
Lord Jesus we're we're ready you're welcome we want you to return come it's a call to Jesus then it says this and let the one who is thirsty come let the one who desires take the Water of Life without price if you've been walking through the Book of Revelation with us or if this is your first time and you're reading this and you're saying I I want that I want forgiveness I want when Jesus returns for that to be good and glorious and wonderful I want that to be the day I've been longing.
For I want that I want to belong here maybe you show up and and you don't know who's new and who's not new and you're looking around the room and you're seeing people talk to each other and be excited and and you're seeing the love that shared here and you're going I I want that if you're thirsty come if you want that you can have it that's the promise that you can go to Jesus and say I want your forgiveness and he gives it and I want your mercy and he gives it I want to belong I want you to rescue me I want you to save me I want you to help me.
He does the Bible tells us that nobody will be put to shame who trusts in Jesus nobody says I was banking on Jesus I was hoping he would help I would hoping he would rescue I would hoping he would wash I would hoping he would make me clean I was hoping in him and that doesn't work everybody who trusts in themselves everybody who trusts in something else will be put to shame it will fall apart but nobody who trusts in Christ will.
If you're thirsty come you get to say Lord save me help me rescue me and he will he Delights to he loves you so much he died so that he might do that he shed his blood so that you might be washed clean that's his hope that's his Delight that's his Joy Heaven rejoices when that happens the one is thirsty come let the one who desires take the Water of Life without price Verse 18 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book.
If anyone adds to them God will add to him the plagues described in this book and if anyone takes away from the words of the pro of the book of this prophecy God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city which are described in this book we are to take the Scriptures seriously throughout Church history that we understand that this is particularly specifically describing applying to the Book of Revelation but it also Christians if just always understood as the Book of Revelation stands at the end of God's Revelation to us as a general understanding of how to treat the Scriptures.
When Jesus says not the little Dash that crosses the tea or the Little Dot that dots an eye will perish from the law all of it will stay all of it will hold all of it belongs that we're to be people who hold to and believe the word we're to be people who don't take away from it you you should be very careful the times when you want to say well that doesn't really count now there are places where we see that there are things that from the Old Testament that are fulfilled in Christ that he's fulfilled the law on our behalf we don't have a sacrificial system anymore.
Because we have a sacrifice but the Scriptures teach us that we understand that there are some places where things have changed as the Revelation is is unfurled but we can't look at things and go well that's not really what that means and we understand a little better than that now and we don't really apply that part but we're to be people who trust and know the word and believe it and hold to it and hope in it as we trust and believe and hope in Christ This is not to say that.
If you ever at any point are confused about a thing or say anything wrong suddenly your salvation is in danger that's that's not what this is being said here but it is to say to those who would try to make new Revelation on behalf of God or would try to cut large sections of the Scriptures out it's an indication of that they don't belong to Jesus verse 20 he who testifies to these things says surely I am coming soon amen come.
Lord Jesus these are the last two things that are written in the Scriptures one of them is Jesus says I'm coming soon and if you're paying attention he said soon many times in this text this is the fourth one where the word soon shows up just in this section that he's coming soon he's coming soon he's coming soon now Peter tells us that his Reckoning of soon is different than our Reckoning of soon in second Peter chapter 3 and I I just in general we know that you base soon off of the person who's speaking not the person who's listening this is most evident.
When dealing with children when will that happen the adult says soon the adult is operating on an adult timeline the adult also knows what soon means in that sentence for them because they're the one speaking so if my son says when is Christmas and it's November I can say soon but I know the whole calendar I can see it in front of me he doesn't and he can the same day say when is dinner and I can say soon and I have not lied to him either time.
But when I give him dinner he's thinking boy Christmas is about to be here and one of the things we need to understand is that when the Lord says soon that's some of what is to be understood that's what Peter says that a day to him is a thousand years a thousand years a day he's on a different timeline and he also sees it he knows exactly what's happening but the other thing we're supposed to understand is when he said don't seal it up soon means soon Peter says really he's not delayed he's patient he's kind there are those who belong to him who have not yet repented of their sin confessed him there are.
Those who will spend eternity with him that have not yet we have missionaries hadn't made it to him yet there are tribes and tongues and languages and people that needed somebody to go so that they might gather around the throne there are people groups there are those who need to belong to Christ and will worship him for eternity and he is returning soon but he also loves them and is at work with patience so that they might come but we stand where this soon is sooner than.
When John heard it and we should respond like the spirit like the bride and like John and say come Lord Jesus and I think one of the things that we should test our Souls with is how much do we say that long for that believe that hope for that how much do we actually look forward to the return of Christ I have a cousin who has worked in several political campaigns and when you're working in a political campaign you want that politician to get elected that's what you're working towards.
But the people who are working higher up in political campaigns it's not just this is the person they like so they're handing out some flyers it's that when this person gets elected they go from being in the campaign to being in the cabinet they they go work for them they go belong now if they don't win you don't have a job and you really built your last year or two or three years off of this person winning and y'all there's a hope and a longing.
For political positions political leaders that can put the Church to shame at times because we aren't living with the hope and the longing for Christ's return the way we ought to and I think we ought to look and say does my money look like I've pinned my hopes on Christ does my time look like I've pinned my hopes on Christ does the way I interact with my neighbors look like I've pinned my hopes on Christ does my hope and longing for my children.
Look like I've pinned my hopes on Christ I think sometimes when you talk to parents about their children they're hoping things like Comfort success a good job a nice life I don't know many parents and you say what do you want for your children and they look at you and say I want them to have such a thirst for the Gospel that they get run ragged for the sake of Christ I hope they bleed for him I hope they suffer for him I hope they get him whatever it takes there are places that do not know Christ there are neighbors in your people in your circle that do not know Christ I was thinking this.
Morning that if I found out I won't but if I found out 30 minutes before that Jesus was about to return I do not think for one half second I would think man I was really hoping to find out whether or not the Chiefs would three repeat but I might think I really should have told my neighbors about Jesus and there's a longing for the return of Christ there's an aching for the return of Christ that when John hears he's going to come soon he says yes come.
Lord Jesus and John is exiled on the aisle of Patmos for proclaiming the Gospel and there should be an ache and a longing in the Church that manifests itself daily in how we interact with the world around us as we long for the return of Christ but y'all he is going to return and it's going to be wonderful he's going to undo everything that's wrong he's going to restore what is right he's going to be praise and glory and honor to his name he's going to be Vindicated and Justified among the Nations he's going to be held high he's going to be praised he's going to be glorified we are going to gather with the.
Church with the Saints we are going to be washed and made new and we are going to stand in his radiant glory for all eternity come Lord Jesus he's going to wash away our sin make us whole we will be fully known but there will be no shame no guilt no lingering doubt come Lord Jesus that he's going to return and restore and make right and bring Jud judgement on the wicked and crush the head of the serpent and he's going to cast death into the Lake of Fire come.
Lord Jesus that he will one day sit ruling and reigning as the king with his enemies as his foot stol come Lord Jesus that everything that is broken in our bodies and in our minds everything that we've all this anxiety and fear and overwhelming nature of everything that's around us will be but a a hint of a whisper of a memory that points to the Glorious Radiance of Christ who rescues and redeems redem Sinners come Lord Jesus and the final words of the text the grace of the.
Lord Jesus be with you all amen y'all he doesn't say so get to it he doesn't say so you better keep it together now he's in the text he's called us to endurance he's called us the faithfulness he has but his final words are may his grace be with you may the forgiveness and the mercy the freedom and the joy of belonging to Christ be with you and I will tell you this Grace the genuine joy and freedom of Grace is what drives us to tell other people not fear the Delight that we have and knowing that we're forgiven is what drives us to confess the knowing that Christ will return and he will rescue.
And he will redeem and he will save someone like me who does not deserve it is what makes us want to tell others that we might live in Grace in just a moment we're going to take communion together and communion is one of the ways that we live in Grace it's one of the consistent reminders we we take communion off often it's one of the consistent reminders that we need the work of Christ to atone for our sin and that we have the work of Christ to atone.
For our sin I have appreciated that as I dip it and hold it and walk back to my chair that there's some realness it reminds me of the reality of the hope I have in Christ it reminds me of he actually shed his blood there are times where the juice drips on my fingers and I think no it really ran his blood was really spilled I am really washed because he really made the payment and then we get to live in Grace and we get to partake and say come.
Lord Jesus come rescue come bring Hope come bring restoration and then we get to leave and go live like our hope is in the imminent return of Christ who repeatedly tells us he's going to come like a thief we will not know when it's coming if you have not trusted in Jesus we invite you to if you are thirsting for salvation and hope and forgiveness you can have it not based off of you but based off of him Church family take a moment to confess to repent to.
Remember why you need the Gospel and then take communion if you are not a Christian communion is not for you you were invited to trust in Jesus but communion is not for you because you are not yet in Grace and you are not yet ready for him to come let's pray father may your grace be with us may you help us to endure and Lord may you come quickly in Jesus name amen band's going to come back up we're going to sing together and take communion.
When you're ready.
Revelation 22:1-5
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning what a joyous morning y'all this this is some of the best mornings all year um my name is Spencer I am one of the pastors here and uh we are in the final chapter of the Book of Revelation the final chapter the Bible you can flip there on your blue Bibles uh the text will be on the screen today um some of you may have started a reading plan uh at the beginning of this month uh or uh I read the Bible in a year plan we as a Church.
For those who want to be a part of we have a read the Bible in two years plan but both of them um and many of these plans they start the same way they start in the book of Genesis and you read the first two chapters of Genesis and you see creation and you see the Garden of Eden but they also most of them end in the same place too they end in this Final Chapter they were in in the Book of Revelation.
And if you read the beginning and the end you're going to see some similarities you're going to see Eden and then a version of Eden that kind of jumps off the page especially in the passage one verses 1 through five that we're in uh today because the New Jerusalem is a lot like Eden you're going to see a river that very much resembles the the the river that flow through Eden you're going to see it flow through the New Jerusalem that you're going to.
See the tree of life uh again in the the new heavens and the new Earth and what we're reading today and that's because it's very much like Eden which is why theologians will often say that this is Eden restored the the New Jerusalem is Eden restored uh but I actually think that doesn't quite capture uh what's happening in this passage I I think it's a little more than just restored uh you could say reimagine you could say revamped you could say reloaded.
But there's little something extra to this that we're going to see in some of the pictures that we're going to sit in today uh and one of the things I find helpful about and the reason why we slow down as we're finishing out the Book of Revelation one of the things I found helpful in sitting in these pictures is it holds out the end for us in a way that is helpful for our souls it's just so deeply helpful I was listening to a book yesterday and and he was making the argument that people can endure almost anything.
If they know there's an end to it so I mean that that can be a hard workout that can be a really tough project at work like you actually grind and and get to the end of it as long as there's an end like humans need an end uh to be able to make it to it and we have that and I I just another five verses where we get to hold that out in front of us and see this is the end.
For the people of God for Christians this is where we are going and it is helpful for us as we seek to embody what is one of the main themes of this book The Book of Revelation uh it will help us endure to it so I'm going to read the first these first five verses then we're going to walk through a little more slowly uh then the angel showed me the river of the Water of Life bright as Crystal flowing from the Throne of.
God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city also on either side of the river the Tree of Life with its 12 kinds of fruit yielding it fruit each month the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the Nations no longer will there be anything a cursed but the Throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it and his servants will worship him they will see his face and his name will be on their foreheads and night will be no more they will need no light of lamp or sun.
For the Lord God will be their light and they will reain forever Endeavor let's pray Heavenly Father we pray that you might open our eyes to behold the end of reality in a way that would compel our hearts to live every single moment of Our Lives striving for life with you in the new heavens and the new Earth God that will take the breaking of our desires for lesser than things here that will take really for some here today even the breaking of their hope that they put in this life.
So they might put their full hope and faith in you but Lord none of this can be accomplished outside of the work of the Holy Spirit so God I pray that you would work you'd open our hearts to receive your word and it would change us to live striving for that day in Jesus name amen all right so let's sit in this first few pictures verse one it says then the angel showed me the river of the Water of Life bright as Crystal flowing from the Throne of.
God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city so let let me stop there for a moment there's something that's that's really beautiful here that's actually not the main point but I don't I think it's worth stating that this is a city but it's also Rural and it's got some rural elements in it it's it's a garden type City there's this beautiful river that flow goes through it there's uh the tree of life that we're going to.
See in a moment that's fruitful that this is a a Garden City now Chad made the point last week that for some of you that aren't as big a fan of the Cities which Chad also he's from the country he very much loves the country this is hard to be like oh this is where we're going it's it's a city some of you are like ah this but that means there's a lot of people right that's not really my style my wife was uh a big fan one of her favorite movies was The Little Mermaid growing up um it's.
If you haven't seen it um it's about a mermaid and she's little and she really wants to not be a little mermaid she wants to be a little human so she uh she desires to to walk and to be amongst the humans and she sings a song that says I want to be where the people are and my wife like she loves that movie but like it just it breaks right there because she has a shirt that says I want to be where the people aren't cuz she's just not we've talked about this like this be a lot of people there and it's like yeah yeah there's there's going to be a lot of people.
There it is a city and there will be lots of uh people for sure but I don't think that we quite fully understand uh what it will be like to be amongst thousands of years of saints that are living in perfect harmony with one another perfect love binding us together in the presence of God it won't be chaotic it will be beautiful and wonderful in the ways that we can't wrap our minds around but it's not just a city there's these these elements that that bring it to life in a way that is different than some of the concrete jungles that we have here uh in uh in on Earth we do have there I.
Think one city that might picture this somewhat is the city of Singapore um they're they're striving to make this uh Singapore more like a Garden City so there's lots of really pretty landscapes that they've kind of built into the fabric of these buildings because um it's a it's a small country and a small City and you if you look at a bunch of pictures of Singapore you might see elements of like how really neat uh they have built the city but even that quite can't capture it I think you can think of some of the most beautiful elements of creation and Landscapes across the world I think you can use your imagination to think about.
The physical side of what the city will be I think of of the Mountains of Montana how beautiful they are I think of the City of Cape Town South Africa which is a beautiful city you can sort of piece it together but even all of these wonderful uh parts of creation these wonderful cities these wonderful things that we have here on Earth don't quite help us capture what it's going to be like and how beautiful it's going to be I mean Chad even last week was walking us through the the design of of of the city and the gate and the walls and how the streets of gold and the gyms and all of it.
And it's wonderful but we still can't quite wrap our minds around how beautiful it's going to be and yet the physical side of the city is not even the main point the the spiritual reality that's at play is far bigger In this passage far bigger than what we're just physically trying to to picture here because the spirituality plays are wonderful it says the Water of Life this River that's bright as Crystal and all of its beauty flows from the Throne of.
God the father and Christ the son and this is Ezekiel imagery as well uh The Book of Ezekiel chapter 47 and Eden kind of coming together to help us see this wonderful clear Crystal River which is also hard for us to to to picture because the Conger which is a few feet away wherever whatever distance that is is not clear it's quite mudy but this beautiful clear River pictures something bigger than just the physical reality at play there is this uh picture of eternal life that flows from.
God and that's what this is this is pointing to eternal life and really Eternal satisfaction you see water is for you need water to live without a a few days without it you will not live so we're always drinking we always needed to sustain us and there's going to be this eternal sustaining this eternal life that flows from God that fully satisfies it would be a place where we don't thirst any longer there will be Eternal flourishing and and power and Glory that flows from.
God to the people of the city that we'll get to experience for eternity God's eternally sustaining his people satisfying his people says the angel showed me the river of the Water of Life bright as Crystal flowing from the Throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city and then it says also on either side of the river the Tree of Life with its 12 kinds of fruit yielding its fruit each month the leaves of the tree were.
For the N the healing of the Nations so a few different things going on here so this is if you read Genesis 2 this is the tree of life that we see uh in the Garden of Eden and it's and its back but it's also again it's Ezekiel 47 Ezekiel 47:12 says and on the banks on both sides of the river there will grow all kinds of trees for food their leaves will not wither nor their fruit fail but they will bear fresh fruit every month.
Because the water for them flows from the sanctuary their fruit will be for food and their leaves for healing so this is what Ezekiel was picturing and seeing and its final form now as Chad talked about last week there is no Temple God is the temple and the picture here is God Sanctuary dwelling living with his people and as he lives with us forever he will sustain us forever he will provide for us forever that the the the tree of life is a picture of Eternal provision that.
God will for eternity provide for his people that there's this appetite in us to be satisfied and God will fully and forever satisfy this urge for fulfillment will be eternally found in him and we can't miss that how how wonderful that would be because so much of our life is searching for the next thing that will satisfy and the next thing that will satisfy and God is saying it is here it is here and you'll eat of the tree and you will be satisfied.
So there's there's a part of that that's really wonderful to sit in to to to realize how wonderful that's going to be but also there there's this idea of of harvest and and fruitfulness that happens every month that if you've ever tried to grow something you know the Harvest is brief if you get it like right now I have a apple tree in the backyard and we lived in this house for 5 years and it has not bore one apple not a one I mean.
Jesus says you'll know a tree B its fruit so it's possible it's not an apple tree it's possible it's a disappointment tree it just never bears fruit and I am about to heed the rest of Jesus's words and cut that sucker down throw it in the fire but I've also got some peach trees that I've planted they're more mature peach trees and I'm excited about the possibility of South Carolina peaches showing up here in the next uh few months but then even that has to go right like it's the the freeze has got to stop at some point and it can't show back up late in the season and freeze the buds and kill the.
Peaches and then maybe just maybe if all the conditions are correct in June we'll have a harvest of peaches maybe but that's that's that's work this side of the Fall now that's the thorns and thistles of trying to see fruitfulness and striving to get it and that's our lives y'all that's what we do that we work and strive really hard to carve out moments of of of enjoying the fruit like you might work really really hard to have that one week of vacation that's supposed to be.
So good and so wonderful and you put all your like I just and and that that's going to bring the rest that you need or the enjoyment that you're looking for that you save up money so that you can be able to go to the concerts that are so enjoyable like in a couple of weeks there's a band that I'm obsessed with called the red clay Strays and they're coming to the township and I just missed out the tickets sold out and I you know on the secondary Market they're just ridiculously priced.
So I'm just holding out hope like someone is just going to say hey I can't make it the day of and I get in somehow to see 90 minutes of musical magic but it's just like even just that just that that brief moment of of of fruit that you get to enjoy from your labor as we're searching for that everyone's working hard for those pockets of Joy those pockets of memories and when you finally get them one it's still not enough.
But there is a day that is coming and the picture here of the fruitfulness that God provides is that it will be every month it's not just for a month every month you get to enjoy the fruit that comes from God to be satisfied to have it all eternally met in him and you get this picture of a tree that provides the type of longing that we've so deeply wanted and also its leaves are for the healing of the Nations and the imagery of this is that all the nations every tribe nation and tongue every Christian that has endured and suffered through trials through persecution through the plight with sin and its effects in our.
Lives that there is a day coming where healing happens that the suffering and the trials and the Brokenness of this present life will be eternally healed this is what we saw when uh chapter 21 when it says that he will wipe away every tear from our eyes that it will be a distant memory and I find that to be incredibly encouraging there's a Puritan Pastor English Puritan Pastor in the 17th century named Richard Baxter um and I quote him from time to time you may not know who he is he he was a pretty big deal back in the day.
So big that like in the 17th century he like outsold Shakespeare in popular literature so he was he was a uh a massive deal and he began writing in his 30s when he was told by a doctor uh that he was going to die he was sick we probably think now he had tuberculosis and he was told that he was going to die and he actually didn't he actually lived into his 70s but he lived Liv every day basically in a lot of pain always sick always in pain.
But the first book that he wrote when he was told that he was going to die uh was the Saints Everlasting rest and this book was meant to help picture where we are going and the Eternal rest that we will have from this painful life of sin and suffering and death and I love this quote that he has he says though every man naturally bth sorrow and loves the most Merry and joyful life yet few do love the way to Joy or will endure the pains by which it is obtained they will take the next that comes to hand and content themselves with Earthly Pleasures rather than they will Ascend to heaven to seek It.
And yet when all is done they must have it there or be without it woo he I mean he says that he he articulates The Human Condition well we don't love suffering we don't love sorrow we don't love this we actually love joy but the reality is is that where true ultimate Joy is found most of us don't want the endurance that it takes to get there the pain that comes with that we don't want the calling of the Christian Life that is a denial of self that is seeking uh to be obedient to the will of of.
God that may call trials upon your life and difficulty upon your life that we don't want that that we will content ourselves with lesser pleasures and distract ourselves with lesser Joys and he says oh I love that quote that we'd Ascend to heaven and seek it that we' be a people the Ascend to heaven the Ascend to the city of God to ascend to where ultimate Joy is found and if our aim of our life is not to find Joy there we won't have joy at all and I.
So appreciate what he presses upon us and for the next 40 Years of his life after he wrote this book in pain he ascended through suffering and trials and persecution he ascended to the city of God to heaven or there will be a day where you have joy and you have provision and there is a healing that comes that wipes away the pain of this life where there will be no more war and no more trauma you will not be haunted by your past anymore.
If you do think of your past you will think of it in the most mature glorified state where all you were led to is this endless Praise of God because God I don't deserve to be in the city because of what I have done but because of what you did for me Jesus Christ on the cross I get to worship you and Delight in you for eternity and that'll be the way that we think about our past verse three we continue to.
See more pictures here it says no longer will there be anything ACC cursed but the Throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it and his servants will worship him there won't be anything a cursed a cursed is living under the curse of sin no more sin no more living under its curse we just got out of the Christmas season where we sing Joy to the World it's a hymn that Isaac Watts uh wrote and hundreds of years ago.
Now I wasn't there when Isaac Watts wrote this hymn uh but I I think you can look at the hymn and study what he's saying and maybe come to the conclusion that it actually wasn't about Christmas that actually Joy to the world is about this it's about the new heavens and the new Earth that certainly we I love to sing at Christmas because Christ's coming initiates that right but when you look at Joy to the World when you get to to the stanza that says uh no more let sins and Sorrows grow nor Thorns infest the ground he comes to make His blessings flow far as the curse is found that is all this language.
There is a day coming where there is no more sins there is no more Sorrows the Thorns that make this life fruitless will be gone that he will make His blessings flow for as the cursed is found that that everything that is painful about this life that the curse has touched will be replaced with his blessed Reign like that's wonderful news to know that the curse will not have an effect on us any longer that the death of loved ones that the difficulty of Life uh and and and work and relational Strife with one another that the persistent sin and Temptation that plagues us will be no more that is a wonderful thing to.
Look forward to that in the city of God will be nothing that is our cursed we will live only under the perfect reign of God and we will worship him we will worship him now sometimes when this idea shows up I've heard it said with certain people that will say I just don't know how great Heaven is going to be or how great this is going to be the new heavens and new earth I mean just we're going to sing all the time and it's like.
First off I don't think you're fully picturing because sometimes it's like this disembodied experience we're just floating like angels singing all the time and it's like I don't you're not picturing this well like we have texts that help us see where this is going you need a better imagination based on the text like I want to point you to bigger things that are happening here but also what I think happens is what is undersold is singing itself and worshiping God I think what happens is is that this is kind of seen like I this isn't all that joyful and I I want to push us on on it should be like.
If if if you stand cross-armed and kind of quiet and don't engage in the worship that both we are offered to Delight in in worshiping God and also very clearly commanded to from the Scriptures but you're missing out on this joyful delighting through singing To Our God you're missing out on something wonderful and beautiful like have you ever been in a stadium when the big play happens like this year if you were ly enough to go to the bazou Gamecock game where in the final seconds rocket Sanders got the shovel pass and bulldozed five people into the end zone and the stadium erupted in such a loud praise that it registered on the RoR scale.
Here locally or have you ever been at a concert where a band at the height of who they are and what they're doing playing their best song Maybe you saw journey in the 80s and you were like there when y'all shouted Don't Stop Believing and you felt the electric joy that was in the arena all of that does not compare to the type of worship and joy that we get to have in Christ for eternity so if you are bored with singing or bored by that idea you have not tapped into the joyful worship that we have in Christ.
Now and your imagination is not expanded enough on what it will be when we actually get there and we should we should grow in that now into eternal eternity that leads us to verse 4 which i' argue is probably one of the most powerful and beautiful Promises of the Scriptures verse four they will see his face and his name will be on their foreheads they will see his face that we will behold the face of God we will behold the face of.
God Moses who had an intimate relationship with God in ways that hardly any other human who has ever lived will he desired to see the face of God he desired to see the glory of God that is bound up in his face and God tells him in in Exodus 33 you cannot see my face and you cannot see my face and live you will die because sinners in our sinful State cannot behold the glory of God and live we are not capable of living that our sin the presence of.
God we we can't we can't do it and there's this desire to see the face of God but there is a day that is coming that with resurrected bodies that aren't are not under the curse with eyes that are perfectly glorified we will behold the face of God we will see him how wonderful is this that's what makes everything that we're reading about here so much more wonderful like I I I was uh out of town a couple of weeks ago.
For a week and I so missed home and I just when I drove the eight hours back to home when I got home I I didn't go man when I pulled in the driveway look at look at the vinyl sighing on the house and then I stepped in I didn't go oh the luxury vinyl plank flooring look at the backsplash in the kitchen like I just that wasn't what I was excited about I miss my people I miss my wife I miss my kids and I wanted to.
See them and and everything that we're reading about that is so glorious about the tree of life and the city it's not home without God it's not wonderful without him it's just not God is what makes it so deeply wonderful and and and when the Scriptures in Psalm 19 in Romans chapter 1 tell us that creation reflects the invisible attributes of God that some of the attributes that are bound up at the very character of who God is is revealed in his glory and creation I mean think about that being in the desert sky and looking up and seeing the Majesty of the Milky Way or being able to.
See the snowcapped Rockies or the northern lights or the most beautiful parts of creation that all of that is but a mere reflection of the glory of God that is bound up in who he is which is revealed most plainly in his face the face of God the idea here is that you don't truly know someone unless you have seen their face which you know that right like there's there's there's a part of you that until you've seen or you've felt their face that you actually you don't really know them fully that's why.
When you're trying to picture somebody that you're just just like you're you're thinking as soon as you see their face oh yeah yeah that person so was part of when when Co was happening was so frustrating because you couldn't see someone's face but there's something about the face of God that you will actually know him that we will actually know our God like we're supposed to know him that there's this Transcendent power and Glory that flows emanates from him that we.
See in part here in this life that will see in full with brand new eyes to see and behold him and then there's this intimate knowledge of who he is that we will know him like you know your best friend you will know him and that is something that the people of God have longed for Moses longed for it in the book of Exodus uh Philip in John chapter 14 wanted to see the father like there's this this desire to see his face.
Because the power and the glory the majesty and the Wonder and the beauty that's bound up in his face that's why in numbers 6 and the Priestly blessing that's put upon the people it says may his face shine upon you that his character and His glory and his goodness and his blessing may shine upon you that you might live in light of his blessedness that is bound up in knowing him and beholding his face there is a day coming where there will be no more separation between.
God and man that we will not fearfully tremble in his presence that we will see his face we'll be marked by him we see the language of of name on the forehead here this something we seen throughout the Book of Revelation that you will belong to him he claims you you will belong to him and we will Behold our God for who he is the perod and Pastor Richard sibs once wrote he said the Christian will desire to see the beauty of.
God in his house that his soul might be ravished in the Excellency of the object ravished there in the 17th century meaning overwhelmed in joy and that the highest powers of his soul his understanding will and affections might be fully satisfied that he might have full contentment that the desire for the Christian is to one day behold and see God in a way that we will be ravished in the Excellency of who he is that all of our will in our affections and our ultimate desires that that God-shaped hole that we've tried to fill with lesser things here on Earth to be satisfied that.
For the Christian that will be fully filled by God in a way where we will see him and we will no more want and no more uh seek for other things because we'll be fully satisfied in the Excellency of Christ ravished in the Excellency of Christ for eternity what a beautiful gift that we will give have as we get to see and behold and know our God and the final picture I want to look at here for today is in verse 5 and he says a night will be no more they will need no light of lamp or sun.
For the Lord God will be their light and they will reign forever and ever and the first part of that is that there will be no more night night is where suffering is is felt uh where sin infects and does its damage that's the the picture of night here that won't exist anymore that in the city of God there will only be perfect light and righteousness that emanates that flows from God himself there will be no more darkness no more pain no more sadness no more sin and it says they will reign forever that we will reign with.
God forever in the garden God made Adam and Eve to coign alongside him by giving dominion over the world and that rain was broken and fractured when they chose to find their ultimate delight and satisfaction in something else other than him and that rain has been fractured and broken ever since but there is a day that is coming when the perfect reign of God will be invited into to Reign alongside him until then we need to see that clearly because there's a part of us.
Now that wants to rain here on Earth there's a part of us that wants to create and to and to make kingdoms here on Earth that we think are going to satisfy us but you need to understand it never will like we had the snow day this this week and my kids got to play in the snow and they built a a a a snowman very small and we're excited about it because it's yeah you should be this is South Carolina the fact that we had enough snow to build it even a small snowman is amazing and they were.
So excited to build it and what happened just a few days later sun came and it's gone and that's us y'all that's what we do we build these kingdoms here on Earth thinking they will fulfill they will satisfy they will bring joy if I just have this if I just have that if I can just accomplish this if I can just accomplish that then I'll be okay and then you do it and you're not okay and it's because those things fade and they don't last.
But you're invited into a reigning with Christ that resounds for eternity that has only fruitfulness and and and blessing and satisfaction and joy that does not end so this is where we see that Eden really takes a further step and how it's pictured in the New Jerusalem in a way that is just a little bit better and I think a way that doesn't get discussed enough of how Eden is actually not quite as wonderful as the New Jerusalem is the idea of everything that it will take to actually get there of everything that you'll endure to actually get there in The.
Lord of the Rings series uh when the hobbits leave the Shire Sam wise Gangi is one of the hobbits who goes on this journey to save Middle Earth he he misses the Shire he loves the Shire he didn't want to leave in the first place he loves it and throughout the three books and three movies you see over and over again that he is longing for the Shire he's longing to get back to the sh he misses it he thinks about the food and the hills and how beautiful it is and at the end.
When they finally defeat evil when it finally ends when he gets back to the Shire he appreciates it so much more for what it is because of everything it took to get there and that's why I think the New Jerusalem is going to be that much better that everything that we endure in this life and all the sufferings and all the trials and all the sin and all of the Brokenness and all of the death that all of it that once we.
Finally get there we'll understand oh man how wonderful is this the journey it took to get here was so long and it was so hard and I lost so much but I gain so much more the sufferings of this present life make the enjoyment of the fruit of the tree beholding the face of God it makes all of that so much sweeter which is why we are called to endure that's why at the End of This Book God is helping us.
See the very theme of Revelation to endure because that's where this is going we should leverage all of our Lives to ascend to ascend to the city of God where he will Rule and Reign and we will rule and Reign alongside him for eternity the band's going to come up and we will have an opportunity to worship but I don't want to miss something the reality is is that there undoubtedly is folks here that have actually not fully made this the ultimate aim of their existence that the aim of your life is not to make it to live with.
God forever and enjoy him that if you're honest with yourself the aim of your life is to build kingdoms here to find enjoyment here to find satisfaction here and what Richard Baxter said was true that if you don't make that the end goal God and life with him forever you'll miss out on on Joy for eternity my hope is that if you are honest with yourself and you come to the realization that your life is not fully centered on pursuing God and loving and delighting in him into eternity that right.
Now that in humility you would trust in him that you'd place your faith in him that you'd realize that because you have sought to build kingdoms here on Earth you've sought to be satisfied with lesser things here on Earth that is what Adam and Eve did they rejected God and Ed they they went after lesser things and the wages of that Pursuit what we earn because of that is death and hell but God loved us so much that he did not leave us in our sin.
But he came Jesus Christ came to live a life that we could not live to die on the cross for our sins to have his blood cover our Rebellion so that we might be resurrected into New Life The Very Waters that we s celebrated this morning and the change that happened in the Millers in their life is because they trusted fully in the grace of God and what he has done for them that is offered to you so that you might make the end of your life the chief end of your life there and that you'd spend the rest of your days ascending to that eternal glory ious reality.
But that will not come if you do not humble yourself in faith and as we sing to pray and to ask Jesus to cover your sins and to give you new life in him so that you might in the weeks to come stand in these Waters and declare the change that has happened so that one day you might actually be with us as the people of God by the river by the tree of life looking at the face of God God beholding him forever let's pray heavenly.
Father I pray that you might break the hearts of those who were lost in this room to behold you to trust in you fully and for those of us that that are Christians that we just keep running after lesser things we keep trying to desire Lessing things we we keep trying to chase after things that do not satisfy that we would right now through worshiping you and beholding you repent and turn to you that we might Ascend to the city of.
God and live our lives in light of that we ask this in Jesus name amen.
Revelation 21:9-27
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 Revelation chap 21 we are finishing up the the Book of Revelation in the next few weeks and we have reached the part of the Book of Revelation where we are getting to see into eternity getting to see the new heavens and the new Earth and one of the things that you should do when you're reading the Bible is you should ask why is this here what is this meant to to teach me what is this meant to tell me why why did they use these words and not other words why did they include this information.
But not other information that's one of the things that you do when you study the Bible why is this why did they give me this amount of information and not less or more that's some of what you're trying to do when you're looking at it one of the questions we're asking this morning is why why is this here well the The Book of Revelation was written to the Church in distress with a call to endurance I was written to a Church that was in the middle of difficulty hardship pain doubt frustration times where they were going what what is.
God doing and why is this not working and we're trying to follow him but we're being persecuted and it's this call to endurance and then in this this letter this book that's written to these churches and this Church in distress at the end it says look at how wonderful all of this is look at where we're going look at how how good it's going to be but if you'll remember that the point is endurance then we start to answer the question of why is this here it's helping us.
See what the Finish Line looks like it's helping us understand now why we would want to endure it's easy to see what's right in front of us and see why we would want that and one of the beauties of the Book of Revelation is that we actually get a picture of what's to come so that we might Foster in our hearts a desire for that and in some ways what we're doing today is we're we're like a soldier who in the middle of Despair or difficulty in the middle of a watch at night.
When there's fear and anxiety prior to a battle when they're riding to it that pulls out a picture and looks at it to see someone they love in a place that they love and to remind themselves why they're fighting to see something that makes it worth it and to remember this is this is why I'm here this is what I'm defending this is what I'm striving for this picture and that's some of what we get here is we get a picture that reminds us oh this is why we would strive this is why we would endure this is what we're fighting.
For let's pray and then we're going to not go into battle we're just going to look at the pretty picture that's what we get to do today and so it's it's an exciting this morning for us let's pray father we thank you for this glimpse into Glory we ask that you would awaken our hearts to see it we praise your name amen Revelation CH 21 verse 9 so this is John he's seeing a vision he's writing what he sees then he says.
Then came one of the Seven Angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues and spoke to me now John here paying attention writing what he sees one of the Angels who just poured out judgment on the earth starts coming towards him I think there's a moment where it's like but this has happened to him before in in chapter 17 one of these angels came to him and when the angel came to in that time he said come with me I'm going to show you the prostitute and he takes him and he shows him the city of Babylon which is the Pinnacle in some ways of the rebellious nature of humanity.
Turning from God and running from God it would have represented Rome but it would also represent all of humanity turning and running from God it would represent the final version of Rome whatever that is this Pinnacle of rebellion and so this time he says something similar but the exact opposite come and I will show you the bride the wife of the Lamb so last time he said I'm going to show you a prostitute and he showed him the city of Babylon.
Now he's going to say I'm going to show you the bride and he's going to show him the city the New Jerusalem and he carried me away in the spirit to a great high mountain and showed me the Holy City Jerusalem all right real quick that is a direct reference to Ezekiel and John's been doing this a lot there have been a lot of connections to the Book of Ezekiel Ezekiel had this prophetic vision of the in time kind of New Jerusalem this prophetic vision of the remade Temple he talks about a river he talks about the Trees of life he he foresaw U the war of Gog and Magog there's all these connections between.
John and Ezekiel and it's not as important right now but it's going to be real important later in the text but I want to show you that one spot where he's that happens to Ezekiel it happens to John and in some ways John's keeing in his listeners or readers to I'm seeing the same thing Ezekiel Saw and there's already been a lot of references but this is another one okay and he showed me the Holy City Jerusalem coming down out of Heaven from.
God so the the city's been in heaven with God and now it is descending because God's making a new heavens and a new Earth he's making all things new and so this city it's coming down out of heaven now heaven is the place where God dwells it also is the way that they refer to the skies the heavens above declare your glory and in some ways we like to think of it as a place but in in some ways heaven isn't.
So much spatial as it is relational but in this picture we see coming out of Heaven descending to Earth the New Jerusalem the Holy City Jerusalem coming down out of Heaven from God having the glory of God its Radiance like a most rare Jewel like a Jasper clear as Crystal so he's trying to describe this he one of the things that we need to understand is that the city isn't just the stuff in the city although he's going to talk a lot about the stuff in the city.
But he announced this is the bride so we we've got some figurative language here because that's also what the Church is referred to as when Jesus God God throughout the Old Testament would talk to Israel and he would say he's he's the groom and they're the bride when Jesus shows up he starts calling himself the groom capital T capital G groom the groom he I'm I've come to marry Israel it's a it's a bold claim because it's a claim to Divinity John the Baptist says I'm not the groom I'm the best man I just got to be excited.
When he showed up but now I just kind of Fade Into the background it's not not my day but this bride is coming down and it's the city but what makes a city is not just the stuff in the city but the people in the city so that this is both a place and a people because that's how you get a city if it doesn't have people it's a ruin if you show up to New York and nobody's there I would suggest don't go in something bad has happened unless you.
See Will Smith and a dog just don't just don't go in so it's both a place and a people and y'all it's descending adorned like a bride this picture of the groom and the bride finally finally this anticipation this waiting this longing this is what we've been holding out for this is why we're here that's that's some of this picture for us that that Christ in some ways is going finally my bride nothing stands in the way anymore we've waited long enough everything is finished.
When when we just read last week where God the father says it is done that's some of this picture it's finally we've reached the moment that we've all been waiting for so this bride is coming down but then he says this because he's trying to describe it he says it Radiance was like a most rare Jewel like a Jasper now if you don't know much about Jasper this is what Jasper looks like and I doubt you were picturing that now there's different colors of Jasper.
But that like I'm just picturing like when I realized when I would realize when I was picturing gyms like if you make me picture like picture a gym I would just picture um like Hobby Lobby plastic ones that's the only gym like I've never h like I'm just picturing like a plastic this is prettier and then he says like Jasper clear as Crystal so he says now picture of Jasper you picture that and he goes now picture it's clear what exactly I think he's trying to describe something that's very difficult to describe it is gloriously beautiful.
And then he throws a bunch of words at you that you're like those I don't know how to and he's like I'm telling you so that but clear you're welcome it's going to be beautiful all right 12 he's describing something absolutely beautiful and he's going to keep doing it 12 it had a great high wall with 12 gates and at the gates 12 angels okay so he sees the city and part of what makes the city is a wall and he says this has a huge wall great high wall that means safety protection.
If there's a city that that the Church the bride is going to dwell in where there's no fear you think about how much of your life is affected by fear how much of your decisions are affected by fear the purchases you make the way you live the way you Drive where you go where you don't go who you interact with how you feel when you're interacting with people so much of life is built around fear not in this city there's no fear in this city it's beautiful.
So there's great high wall and there's an angel posted at all the gates so good luck trying to get in if you ain't supposed to be in that's kind of how that works it's this picture of protection guarded safe and on the gates the names of the 12 tribes of the sons of Israel were inscribed and on the East three gates on the north three gates on the south three gates and on the west three gates this is exactly what Ezekiel Saw same picture and the wall of the city had 12 foundations and on this them were the 12 names of the TW Apostles of the Lamb.
Okay if you want to enter the city you have to go through a tribe of Israel so in some ways what's being pictured here is not just honoring the tribes of Israel but that the people in the city belong to the tribes of Israel that it's Israel that dwells here that in order to enter the city you are entering into in some ways Israel but you're not entering into Israel without walking on the work of the Apostles that Israel is Seated on founded on the proclamation of the Gospel.
So that this is not a city that has some Jewish people and some Christians that's not the picture here because to belong to Christ is to belong to Israel and to belong to Israel is to belong to Christ there aren't 24 Gates and you can either enter by an apostle or an A A A Tribe you have to enter by both and there's this picture of the people of God are the people of God and that the the New Jerusalem is the true Israel is the true Church and it's also beautiful that the those who the apostles who proclaim the Gospel that.
God honors them that that the work when we say sometimes we'll say that the the Church is plan a and there is no plan B for proclaiming the Gospel that that's built into how this city works that the Church was meant to go Proclaim that's what the apostles they were sent ones to go share this message and so there's this picture of the Gospel that it's founded on the proclamation of the Gospel it's founded on Mission work and it's what it's how you belong to the people of.
God which lines up with Romans and Galatians where the true sons of Abraham are those who are Sons by faith really cool verse 15 the one who spoke with me had a measuring Rod of gold to measure the city and its Gates and its walls again reference to Ezekiel because the angel that comes and meets Ezekiel takes him to a high mountain shows him the city also has a measuring Rod this measuring Rod though is made of gold if if you were interacting with some ambassador from some other place they seemed wealthy.
But every time they pulled out a tool or an instrument they pulled out a pin yall were doing some math problems they pulled out a protractor they needed to measure something they pulled out a tape measure and everything they pulled out was made of gold eventually you you'd be like I'm sorry where are you from what is this place that this the measuring Rod is gold I think that speaks to the absolute wealth of the New Jerusalem but I also think it speaks to the preciousness of the New Jerusalem that even the instruments used to measure it are glorious.
So he's holding a measuring Rod of gold to measure the city and its Gates and its walls the city lies Four Square its length the same as its width and he measured the city with his Rod 12,000 stadia I know you're like that many stadia yes that many stadia it's length and its width and its height are equal okay so 12,000 stadia is like 1300 to 1500 miles that's a big city I'm going show you a picture of that size it be like this size.
So the most uh the uh the Bigg City we have New York has 8.8 million people it's a DOT well it's not even a dot it would be a DOT if they put it on here Philadelphia is a DOT which I thought way to give Philadelphia some love and not put New York but Dallas is on there Houston two cities in Texas I don't I don't know exactly who made this map but that's how big it is it's not going to be located there I just showed y'all that.
Because y'all driven this place more it's probably going to be located here but I don't think y'all have driven around there much some of y'all have been there and some of y'all have driven around there but not a lot and I wanted you to get the scope but it'll probably be there if the new Earth has similar geography but there's something to this city it says that it's length and its width and its height are the same so this is actually how the city is described which means that we don't quite understand what he's seeing this exists in some sort of scope that we can't really wrap our head around you you know.
When you're um when you're watching a sci-fi movie and the the spaceship's coming back into Earth and it catches on fire for a little bit that little I'm going to catch on fire zone of the atmosphere is like 62 miles up and this goes 1500 miles up we don't have any cities like this I don't know what that says I don't know if that speaks to the size of the new Earth I don't know if that speaks to existence existing on some sort of existence that we don't understand how to exist in that way don't even know the words to use other than exist.
But what he's seeing is glorious and unfathomable and beautiful and wonderful and big okay and he says he also measured its wall 144 cubits by human measurement which is also an angel's measurement I love that verse I don't have any insight I don't have any good good way to explain other than him just being like they use cubits too you guys I don't know if that tells us that a one one commentary I read said well this would have to be regular size Angels instead of like the big siiz ones that we've already seen and it just was like sure I guess that's helpful it's not a giant Angel.
If they both use cubits I don't so anyway I just love that it's there uh Isaac and I were discussing it this week he thinks it's so that we won't be annoying with the information he said it's for the guy who goes well hold on a second is that how Angels measure that John was like yes that's how Angels measure so anyway 144 cubits which would be 26 16 ft so cities have walls it's part of what makes a city a city it this is this is why in in the book of Nehemiah that the people around Jerusalem didn't really care that a bunch of Israelites came back.
But they had an absolute fit when they started rebuilding that wall all the people around them started going no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no which is like half of the book of Nehemiah is just people going no no no no no no no no no don't build Build That Wall and the reason why they didn't want to build the wall is because the wall meant protection the wall meant that they belonged the wall meant that they had some ability some agency some existence.
And so he's looking at this wall and he says that it's 216 ft tall so I look this up average height of the Great Wall of China our greatest wall arguably it at least call you know call dibs on the name 26t average height which I I find we're kind of bad at picturing so I've walked around the building today if you're standing in our gym or outside of our gym the height of that wall the one that's gray and has mil City painted on it it's probably around 22 23 ft this that's a big wall the Great Wall is this wall is 10 of those it's a big wall.
Now it is a Tall City 1500 miles but the wall is impressive that if you were trying to come to this city and John having to see it well you would walk up and go I mean it's taller than some of the buildings in downtown like a 15-story building is right around 200 or so feet so it it's big but then he says all right listen this 216 ft wall the wall was built of Jasper which I showed you earlier while the city was pure gold like clear glass the foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every kind of Jewel the.
First was Jasper the second Sapphire the third aate the fourth Emerald the fifth Onyx the sixth Carnelian the seventh chrysite the eighth Barrel the ninth topaz the 10th chapra the 11th Jin the 12th amethyst the 12 gates were 12 pearls each of the gates made of a single Pearl and the street of the city was pure gold like transparent glass y'all first of all there's no list of stones like that in the Bible this one's different so if you're like wait is that the 12 Stones on the ephod that the high priest wore no it's not there's no list like it.
If you I would encourage you to go Google those rocks those stones to get a picture of what this thing looked like but I don't think we're meant to figure out the meaning I think he's articulating Beauty I don't think this is like a code to crack I think it's something to wonder wonder at not wander Wonder this is the wall on the out outside these are the the gates that take you into the city first of all each gate is a pearl the biggest pearl we've ever found is like 62 pounds.
So when you when all the kids are released just pick one of those about that size of a pearl that's the biggest one we've ever found most of them are like you know like this so that means unless God just created it that there's some really big oysters but it's speaking to the magnitude and the glory and the beauty of the exterior wall of the city John hasn't even made it in if you were walking down a street and you saw a jewelry store and the outside was encrusted in Jewels you would be inclined to think those aren't real you still wonder why they were still there cuz you would think people would take those.
But if they were real you'd then be inclined to think a couple of things one how how dangerous are these people that nobody takes these how well policed is this city what did they hide in the safe if this is on the exterior wall what's inside John is staring Starry Eyed at the exterior wall of this city which is glorious Beyond Reckoning 216 ft tall bedazzled in all sorts of gems the each gate is a pearl one Pearl and it's just like and it speaks I think to the absolute wealth of this city it speaks to the safety of it the lack of fear and it also speaks to the value system.
So that it's beautiful and glorious but y'all they're Paving the streets with gold we can walk on it and it's beautiful but at some point people I think are just walking because they're not enamored with gold anymore it's beautiful it's ornate it's glorious you think about the fact whenever we find gold like if you found gold historically how much Bloodshed would follow like when whenever we found something good it it you strike oil you get all these things like difficulty blood like these things people pack to it there's some good that can come out of it.
But there's gold would pass from hands to hands to hands just based off of who was most violent and here's a city where the outside is is glorious beyond all human Reckoning perfectly safe and they just don't value that stuff the way they used to and we're about to see why so just keep going 22 he's about to say something that is startling shocking appalling I saw no temple in the city if you know Ezekiel and you realize that he's been saying I'm seeing what Ezekiel Saw I'm seeing what Ezekiel Saw I'm seeing what Ezekiel Saw I'm seeing what Ezekiel Saw and he's referencing Ezekiel Ezekiel 37 Ezekiel 38 Ezekiel 39 he's going to reference.
Stuff in Ezekiel 46 and 47 when you get to you're going through the book of ezek at Ezekiel 40 the angel with the measuring Rod starts measuring the temple and that's Ezekiel 40 chapter 41 42 43 44 45 and 46 we're measuring the Temple and so everybody going he's there he's there he's there he's there and he goes you no Temple what what do you mean no Temple that was the we were what we were Ezekiel in our way to the temple what do you mean no Temple something.
So much better I saw no temple in the city for its Temple is the Lord the God the almighty and the lamb we don't need a temple because they're there the temple represented the place where God met with Humanity the place where he had placed his presence in small portion so that you could interact with him where he had marked the nation of Israel as belonging to him they had the temple the temple stood as the example that they were the chosen people the temple was the place where they could meet with.
God hear from God the temple was the place where one person could interact in his presence once a year after having sacrifices there's no Temple because God himself is there it's like saying this house has no phones right cuz all the people I want to talk to are here we don't need them anymore he's there this is what we said last week makes heaven heaven that we get God this is why you can pave the streets in Gold because they're just not that important anymore it's not that glorious anymore.
Because the glory of the Lord is there his presence is there there's a there's a Billy Joel song where he says wherever we're together that's my home he talks about living all over the place he's singing to some girl and he's saying but wherever we are Wherever You Are that's where I belong and that that's Christians with the Lord where wherever he is that's Heaven he's that glorious he's that good he's that wonderful there is no distance between us anymore I I was struck by the concept that.
Because of the work of Jesus because there's no stain of sin that what is communicated throughout the New Testament is that we don't there's no separation anymore and and now it's not just no separation between us and sin but there's because of sin there's no separation at all they're literally actually there with him but that if you belong to Jesus you could walk into the holy of holies the high priest was only allowed to go once a year and for for one time after sacrifices.
But because of the sacrifice of Jesus if you could travel in time you could walk into the holy holies and not be struck dead because you've been covered by the blood of Christ and this his manifest presence is there and the the Church for all eternity just gets to participate with him belong to him and the times when we when when that part isn't exciting for us is is just an example of how our hearts need to be awakened to how good he is to how glorious he is.
But if you've ever had those moments when you've really interacted with the presence of God when the spirit's really spoken to you worked in a way in your life and you felt that moment of just like you brushed against eternity it's that but we're capable of handling it I always feel like you ever seen um you know they can run electricity through a pencil it's cool if you can Google it run electricity through a pencil uh it's bad for the pencil though the pencil will run electricity through it.
But it also burns up and that's the way I feel sometimes in the moments where I really have felt the presence of God or the spirit at work where it's like this is amazing please stop it's like this is wonderful beyond all Reckoning but I can't handle it it's like it's like he can send a little bit of his presence his work his glory through something but it's like I can't I'm not designed to handle it and I think that what happens.
When we get prepared with an eternal weight of Glory as Corinthians says is that when we get here we can handle it we're actually conduits of the ability to carry the weight of the glory of God and therefore we are delighting eternally in his presence beautifully and wonderfully overwhelmed but able to handle it and that's this picture there is no Temple because there's no separation because he's there and the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it full of the glory of.
God gives its light and its lamp is the Lamb I do I do not know if that means there is no sun or moon it just says this city doesn't need it but I don't know but in some ways if you'll think about the way the reason why people have worshiped the Sun forever and the way we are dependent on the sun we need the sun we need its warmth we need its light we need heat we need what it does to plants we need the Sun.
And then he John just says yeah it's like the sun lives in that City the warmth the heat the life he's there beyond all comparison beyond all Reckoning there's no there's no need you don't need that you need you need the Lord and you've got it it's a beautiful picture by its light this is the lamp of the Lamb by its light will the Nations walk and the kings of the earth will bring their Glory into it this picture of submission this picture of worship this picture of invitation it says and its Gates will never be shut by day and there will be no night there massive wall huge Gates which speaks to protection defense.
Safety and then it says the gates are never shut which also speaks to Absolute peace and safety and y'all the gates face east west North and South they're always open and there's this picture of this city that sits in the center of all creation says come to the Nations come you're welcome there's not One Direction that's that's not welcome all the nations are welcome all the kings are going to come and bring their Glory into it I think that is meant to be a picture of the Gentiles being invited in rather than something.
For us to Think Through wait there are other kingdoms how does that work I don't think that's what're meant to do there it's it's referencing prophecies from Isaiah from Ezekiel this picture of this invitation this welcoming of the Nations it's actually a proclamation of the Gospel and what Jesus has done that the Nations will come in but it does say this verse 26 they will bring into it the glory and the honor of the Nations everything good makes it into the city there are things that are beautiful about your culture and I don't care what culture you come from there are things that are good and beautiful about way yall approach life or Humanity or.
Music or something there something where you've tapped into something about the nature of God and his personhood and his character and there are things that are absolutely terrible about your culture where y'all are wrong and stupid and you should should stop and that's the way it works but y'all everything good makes it biscuits are in heaven all of the good music all of the creativity all of the beauty it it's not just one culture that that makes it all the nations show up there's this beautiful thing in the Book of Revelation and it plays out also in the rest of the New Testament where you belonging to a people group and having a certain language.
And tribe and type of hair and skin and flavor profile is beautiful and celebrated spicy food is there and that bland nonsense that English people eat is there it's there all the good parts of it and it you ever you ever you know how you can enjoy something because it's new or you can enjoy a person because they think so differently than you and they are so different than you and that you can also enjoy the times when you run into someone who is.
So much like you that you're just like oh this is easy we've seen the same stuff like the same stuff enjoy the same stuff your mama sounds like my mama that's great and the heaven has that where we all belong to each other and there's this Joy of getting to still be us in some ways but the redeemed glorious version of us that all the nations bring in what's good but it gets better but nothing unclean will ever enter it nor anyone who does what is detestable or false.
But only those who are written in the Lamb's Book of Life nothing unclean will ever enter it nor anyone who does what is detestable or false but only those who are written in the Lamb's Book of Life I realized as I was studying this that if if John began to describe heaven the new Heavens the new Earth the New Jerusalem and he used pictures like a mountain an expanse a rich Valley if he only used like Wilderness pictures flowers trees River I'd have just been like thank you he says I.
See a city and I immediately have some hurdles to jump CU part of me is like do we have to live in the city or can we live somewhere else but as I was contemplating this first of all there is a river there are some trees there's some beautiful stuff coming you know so it's not not just City but I realized what makes a city beautiful is the people and what makes it terrible is also the people like we we my my wife and I were trying to plan a trip to New York we almost went last year things got a little busy we're talking about going at some point and I'm just going to.
Walk around go that's my that's my plan when you talk to people about going to New York you get really like one of two responses they either say o y'all should and they tell you some way to partake in culture something that humans have done y'all should go see this thing that a bunch of humans built y'all should go taste this thing that this type of human Cooks y'all should go to this place and see these type of humans that's what they tell you or they say need to be careful and they're not afraid I'm going to get run over by a Subway what they think is going to happen is that one of those.
Humans there is going to attack us I lock my doors at night I am not scared of raccoons I haven't once thought maybe they'll get in the house that's not that's not what I'm doing it's people y'all here's a city that's never known a lie it's never known malice it's never known selfishness here's a city that's filled with brothers and sisters who eternally belong to one another if you turn down an alley in New York and notice someone was following you spun around to engage with them and it was your cousin who you hadn't seen in a year the respon you immediately the whole situation you what are you how what are the odds how.
Did this happen and there's an entire city where we belong to everybody and they belong to us we would trust everybody we Delight to see everybody to interact with everybody and our self-doubt and self-conceit and self- focus and fear and anxiety doesn't exist what the Pinnacle of creation is not the stuff that God made but the humanity that God made that he imprinted His image on it but we've only ever seen the version that also is fallen into sin and one day we get to dwell in a city where that is removed and there's nothing false or fake or evil or Wicked and there's just joy and belonging and love and fellowship and friendship eternally.
John is going to see a couple of glimpses of things that are in the city but in so many ways it looks like he doesn't really enter it he doesn't really get to partake he's gotten us to the to the walls he's looked down the street he's seen some of the massive size he's noted that there is no Temple but he hasn't really gotten to participate and it's glorious and wonderful and beautiful and inviting and it says only those who are written in the Lamb's Book of Life enter meaning only those who have trusted in.
Jesus and his finished work but that we enter not by Behavior or moralism or our own goodness our own righteousness we enter by the blood and the work and the glory of Christ and then we are made new the wonderful beautiful thing about belonging to Jesus is that you are given his righteousness you won't mess Heaven up you'll participate fully and freely forever made right and new by Jesus and we are to be people who take the time to remember this know this welcome this and at times.
When we're doubting or frustrated or fearful and we need some endurance I would encourage you to open up the Book of Revelation and go to the back and say what am I holding on for where is my home pull that picture out and look at it and remind yourself why you're fighting let's pray father we're thankful that we have a glorious hope and a glorious home and a glorious future purchased by Christ and we just get a glimpse of it in the description that John gives us.
But Lord may we hold on May we endure may we say no to sin that's right in front of us so that we might say yes to a a home that has a Founder who is God that we might look forward to a city where everything works as it's supposed to and we have the culmination of culture and goodness and the display of your work in humanity we ask for you help in your grace and the work of the spirit in.
Jesus name amen the band's going to come back up and as a Church we're going to take communion communion is where we celebrate and remember the meal that Christ had with his disciples the night before he was crucified and he took bread and he broke it and he said this is my body broken for you take eat all of you and he takes a cup and he says this is my blood shed for you in a New Covenant take drink all of you and it is.
For those who belong to Jesus we are to regularly remind ourselves that we stand with the blood of Christ covering us the sacrifice of Christ covering us and we stand between his crucifixion and his return and so I would encourage you this morning to whatever picture captures a little bit of your longing and a little bit of your ache that you would take that to the Lord this morning and just thank him for the hope of a Salvation accomplished by Jesus and ask him to help you to continue to endure one more day one more week one more year as you follow Christ towards your home.
If you are not a Christian this is not for you but the gates are open for you to trust in Christ and for you to place your hope in him so when you are ready Church family we'll take communion there's gluten-free communion in that back corner over there.
Revelation 21:5-8
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 will grab a Bible and go to the Book of Revelation chapter 21 we're going to pick up where we left off last week we have been working our way through the Book of Revelation throughout the fall and we are finishing it up in the next few weeks and we have made it to the end and not just the end of the book of Revelation not just the end of the Bible.
But the the end of existence as we understand it now we've made it to what is restoration consummation the the Fulfillment of all the promises we we talk sometimes when we're trying to help articulate the Gospel we we even will train on this sometimes and explain it to our Church family that uh our culture doesn't know the Gospel story anymore they don't know the Bible story anymore and so sometimes it's very helpful to explain creation fall Redemption restoration that God created the world and is good that it has fallen into sin that.
Jesus comes to bring about Redemption and then eventually everything is restored it's renewed it's made new it's beautiful and good again and we are in the Book of Revelation where we get to see restoration we get to see things made new and made good again and as we're looking at this today uh in some ways we're going to see the text is going to talk about an inheritance it's going to refer to a Heritage and a portion which are inh it's inheritance language um it's the language that was used in the Old Testament.
When they were allotting uh land for tribes that they would have a Heritage or they'd have a portion it's what's given out and we're going to see this is given to all of humanity that if you exist as a human you will receive some form of this you'll get this Heritage this portion you'll receive some of it and it one part of The Inheritance one part of the the heritage is unfathomably glorious beautiful wonderful un unpictured By Us in its Excellence delight and joy and the other portion is unfathomably eternally awful destructive horrific and all of humanity is going to end up with one or the other eternally good eternally bad.
If you went to a will reading let's say your your great-grandfather died he was very wealthy you go to the will reading you're there with all the other great grandchildren and it's announced that every great grandchild will receive $1 million and a vacation home except for you you will receive two cats and I know what you're thinking that's twice as bad as one cat and you're right your great-grandfather figured a way to double the punishment you even if you like cats your.
First your first instinct would be what why what what did they do what did I do what did they do to deserve that what did I do to deserve this that would be the question you would be asking what is the dividing line between us why did all of them get that and I got this if before his death your great-grandfather had announc to you all of my great-grandchildren will receive $1 million and a vacation home or they will receive two cats I think your follow-up question would be what's the H how are you going to decide what's the dividing line.
Then you would get to why two cats you know you'd ask that later but first you'd be asking what's how do we get to be in one line or the other and in this text we're going to see these drastically different inheritances and what we're going to ask this morning is what's the dividing line what did they do what did they do and what makes the difference let's pray and then we'll jump into the text Lord we ask for the active work of your spirit as we read your word that we might hear that we might.
See you that we might repent and that we might enjoy life eternal life that is only found in you we ask this in your gracious name and by the work of the Cross amen Revelation 21:5 is where we're going to start and he who was Seated on the throne said now that is God that's who is Seated on the throne he's been seated on the throne throughout the Book of Revelation this is God this is the one to whom they they cast their crowns down they worship this is he who is Seated on the throne was the one holding the scroll and he asked who is worthy to open the scroll and was holding it.
Out to see and he's the one who gives to Christ when he arrives like this is God Eternal king of all things Seated on the throne behold I am making all things new behold is a fancier word to say the southern look at here but that's what he's saying pay attention to this look at this see this I am making all things new and we talked about this some last week with the new heavens and the new Earth the New Jerusalem we're going to talk about it some next week as it begins to picture some of that.
For us but there's this moment when everything gets renewed and restored and made wonderful and beautiful and good again that that the creation that we have now as good and as beautiful as it is because it's creation but then there's fall and so we only get the Fallen version and we only interact with it as Fallen people so even when we're interacting with good things like truth and love and beauty I'm still interacting with them as me it's filtered through my own ability to.
See it enjoy it think about it my own sinfulness get mixed up in that even when I'm enjoying the best of all that the world has to offer I I'm still sinfully filtering it through myself and working with it in I'm I'm messing it up and then we also get the Beauty and the the wonder of the world marred by sin as as Paul puts it in Romans that it's that God subjected the world to bondage to corruption that it's in bondage to corruption that it's corrupted.
So that even though the the heavens declare his majesty they they Proclaim his glory even though that he's his eternal nature is seen in the way the world is made we are only ever interacting with a marred version of it but there's coming a day when we won't we'll spend some time next week trying to imagine some of that trying to think through some of that which is hard for us to do because we've only ever interacted with this one my.
When I was thinking about this I was trying to think about the fact that even in the world that we're in now there's still stuff that we desire that we long for that we convince ourselves if I could just have this I'd be happy this would fix it if I could just achieve this if I could just reach this if I could just have this kind of life this kind of stuff like we're constantly in this creation pursuing parts of this Creation in a way that we think will satisfy us and it's the brok version of it my uh my mom.
When she was growing up she used to go to her aunt Reba's house and y'all do youall know who Rea McIntyre is it's not her um she went to her aunt rea's house and uh at her aunt rea's house her her sister and her cousin um would play with baby dolls and that was what they did they had she always looked forward to go they have baby dolls and she remember when she got older she went back and she got she was visiting her aunt reben she said can I.
See the dolls and so her aunt Reba showed them to her and her cousin had a little girl baby doll that my mom said had all kinds of accessories uh you could comb her hair you could you know rock her in a little rocker she had like a straw leg she was this little baby doll with multiple dresses you know decked out she said her her sister had a little boy baby doll not a lot of accessories but her sister had always wanted to have boys and was.
And then she said she saw the one that she had played with and something terrible had happened you know how like pretty doll hair versus doll hair once it gets all messed up and there's like no fix in that like it just that's what it looked like and it was just a head and a torso no arms no legs no clothes and so she said she asked she said a Reba what happened to my doll and her aunt Reba looked at her and said honey that's all your doll ever was you only ever had a head in a torso like I don't nobody did anything to it that's your doll and I kind of feel.
Like when God makes all things new we'll finally have the eyes to see it and we'll be like the stuff I was chasing after longing for pursuing was only ever a head and a torso like that was it like the thing I was chasing after was only ever this mess this is what it was supposed to be like this is so gloriously good so he's making all things new and it's wonderful then verse six he says this I'm sorry verse 5 also he said write this down.
For these words are trustworthy and true so he who Seated on the throne looks to John and says write this down this is trustworthy this is true which the Bible is trustworthy and true everything he says is trustworthy and true but for some reason he wants to go out of his way to say this is write it down again drawing our attention to something wonderful that is to come and the amount of trust that we can have in it he said to me.
Verse 6 it is done I am the Alpha and the Omega the beginning and the end this it is done pairs with Jesus who on the cross said it is finished and when Jesus says that he's talking about his work that he came to do the work of redemption is finished that there's a hope of redemption now in Christ because the debt of sin has been paid that when we place our faith in Jesus the work of Salvation is finished.
When God says it is done he means that the full application of the work of Jesus is done Redemption has been accomplished we are in restoration that's what he's talking about I'm making all things new it is finished so that Christ's work in some ways was finished his Earthly work was finished on the cross and now God the father's work is finished in accomplishing his will throughout eternity he says I'm the alpha and the Omega which is the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet.
So it be similar to saying I'm the A and the Z the beginning and the end so he's saying the same thing twice there I'm the A and the Z I'm the alpha and the Omega the beginning and the end that he is the point of all existence in creation that it's from him and to him from him and for him it is carried out through him that he's the Genesis and the apocalypse and The Eternity that it's about him and he is big ancient beyond our Reckoning wise beyond our understanding and that it is about him that he's the beginning and the end he said write this down I'm the beginning and the end.
Speaking of his majesty and His glory then he says this to the Thirsty I will give from the spring of the Water of Life without payment the one who conquers will have this Heritage and I will be his God and he will be my son okay so Heritage this is the first inheritance it's the first portion that you would drink from the Water of Life that that is and we'll see later as we look a little more at that a a potentially a reference to the Holy Spirit.
But it's this call to life full life real life eternal life that those who conquer get life eternal full vibrant life and then he says it's to to the one who conquers now that that's the message in the Book of Revelation it's a call to endurance consistently in the sections where we get most caught up in the dragon and the Beast and and the mark of the beast and all this stuff there's these pauses in it where it says this is a call.
For the endurance of the Saints and so this idea of conquering this idea of accomplishing these promises receiving these promises to those who hold on to Christ those who make it to the end and this is what they receive Water of Life eternal life and then he says I will be his God and he will be my son uh my son is in fourth grade and he has started doing analogies youall remember analogies like the um this is to that as that as to this stuff they'd make you do in school.
So like a hat is to your head as a sock is to your foot yeah you guys you nailed it you're ready for the SAT um there in In this passage he says I will be his God and he will be my son and if I was doing the analogy and it said God and then it said blank is to blank I would not have written son it would need to say father then I would put son but it says God and son like.
If I was talking about wife and I asked her to marry me I said will you marry me you'll be my wife and I'll be your if I say anything other than husband it would seem like I went out of my way to communicate something like I went out of my way to try to like if I said you'll be my wife and I will be your landlord immediately it's like hold on what you you're Community like if she said she said yes I will be I you you will be my husband and I will be your project manager it'd be like wait what what about what are we talking about.
And so when he says I will be your God I will be his God and he will be my son it's it's it feels to me when I was reading this text like he went out of his way to communicate something that he's really telling us something beautiful about the nature of our relationship the nature of the relationship of those who belong to Christ those who receive this inheritance and y'all this this is what you have longed for your entire life that he would be your.
God and that you would be his child now son here does carry the idea of receiving an inheritance so don't ladies don't get tripped over that this is what we need we need him to be our God and then we get get to be and the longing of our souls are satisfied with him being our God and with us being his children let me let me show you what this happen What Happens here by him being our God there's a couple of things that happen one he's big enough to actually forgive he's he he by being.
God he he can actually make when he says you're forgiven you can be forgiven this is one of the problems they had with Jesus they kept being like who do you think you are he thought he was God this is this is what he was doing he was showing that he was God but this is when he says you're forgiven when he says that you receive Mercy when he says that he holds these promises he's actually big enough to hold them like.
If you were if you were at Costco and you were looking at something and someone standing next to you said you know what just put that in your C you can have that you can just you can take it I'll walk with you out to the parking lot your immediate question would be who who are you do you have the authority to make that declaration because if you're just some guy offering to help me steal something no thank you but if you're William Costco III and you have the authority to do this.
So when he says that he'll be God that means that all the promises get to be verified and like he he can he can actually forgive he can actually redeem he can actually restore but also the best parts of our lives are when we cease to have them be about us you your most free most Joy most wonderful moments of your life are when you've forgotten you exist and it doesn't happen often it's one of the reasons why uh Middle School was.
So awful it was some of your most self-aware that you ever were you could not not think about yourself and it was it's torment and just so you know that's one of the things that torments us now is that when we think the most about ourselves and how we're thinking and how we're feeling and how we're whatever it's torture that by him being God it means that we can actually be swept up in something bigger than us and you've only tasted that at times.
When you were on a team or cheering for a team when you were in a at a concert sometimes it happens on Sunday mornings when we're singing and we we can forget about ourselves and what we think and what we like for just a moment we just catch that for a moment sometimes that's when you've been at the top of a mountain or at the bottom of a mountain staring at a mountain or when you were looking at the you were flying in the airplane you got to.
Look out and just these moments you had in life where you forgot about yourself and we caught up in something bigger you were free there was Delight there was joy and that's one of the promises that comes with he'll be our God is that he's actually big enough that we can get swept up and that he's wonderful that he's good he's big enough to handle our praise our Delight our worship this is what we've been pursuing that we would be a part of something that was bigger than us and and Christians brothers and sisters as a Christian that you've had those moments where you.
For just I mean and I'm talking about moments 4 seconds 5 seconds maybe a few minutes where you brushed up against the real presence of God and it was the most wonderful thing that's ever happened and you also thought you were going to die you know what I'm talking about it's like you tried to breathe in Eternity for just a moment and it's overwhelming and the promise of this is is that there will be a time when we can handle it.
When he's made us to be able to Bear the weight of glory and we'll be able to be swept up in the immensity of God and not destroyed by it but able to he'll be able to channel it through us and it'll be wonderful and then he says not I'll be his God and he'll be my worshipper follower which is true those are all true he says son which means you'll belong you'll belong you'll be welcome you won't be in heaven thinking I'm.
So glad I'm here but I hope he never makes eye contact with me because then he'll know I'm not supposed to be here we'll have a seat at the table the son of the king doesn't have to go ask for permission to see the king he just gets to go see the king you'll belong you'll be home you'll be home like you you've had that Taste of Home here you've had some places where you were free and part of the reason what makes it home is that you get to forget about yourself you get to just be free.
For a little while you you get to not worry about yourself you get to feel like you you belong here nobody's judging nobody's look like you you just get to be and maybe you had that with a certain group of friends or maybe you had that your actual home growing up or maybe you had that like I don't know where you've but you've had some moments where you've tasted this idea I just belong here and you'll eternally belong and be caught up in how wonderful and good and glorious he is this is what makes heaven heaven.
God and our ability to have him and know him and relate to him is what makes heaven heaven and this is what your soul has been longing for the uh African Church Father Augustine in his confession he wrote our hearts are restless until they rest in you meaning that everything else we've ever tried to fill ourselves up with ultimately fails we're we're we're Restless it's like drinking salt water it promises to satisfy but then it doesn't like a like a table that's been cursed by a witch that looks beautiful and as soon as you start eating the food it turns to gravel in your mouth like that's that's everything that you've ever chased after you.
Said if I could just have this I'd be fixed I'd be fine everything would be good and it just never it never satisfies it never works they were only meant to be enjoyed in relation to him and so they all fall apart when they become an ultimate object of something that would that would fully fix us and so we're longing for something that ultimately will never rest until we rest in him and we get that Spencer said it would be like we talked about this week he said it would be like.
If somebody told you I'm going to give you your dream home if you want a big house it's big if you want a small house if if it's like a brownstone walk up with a little Terrace and a garden that's your thing cool in a little walkable neighborhood if it's like there's not another human Within A Thousand Miles you're on a ranch it's just you and cows and chickens and like a five rifles or whatever it is whatever it is.
Then but then it was you get you get your dream home but your spouse your children your friends whatever like there's this they they can't come and immediately we'd be like oh no deal because it won't be home without them and Heaven's not heaven without God if if he said I'll give you all the stuff but I won't be there that's not heaven because we'd still be restless we'd still never find satisfaction because we were made to find it in him you do realize that's the Supreme Delight of a creature is to worship our creator we were we were meant to get lost in worship of our creator and without that that's why we're running.
Around finding things to worship finding things to to label ourselves with finding things to be bigger than us that we can cheer for or pull for because we're meant for that but he says this will be the inheritance endless life and I'll be his God and he'll be my son verse eight but as for the Cowardly the faithless the detestable as for murderers the sexually immoral Sorcerers idolators and all Liars their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur which is the.
Second death First Heritage eternal life with God as God and you as a child belonging to him second one L of fire and sulfur that if you stood on the seashore and looked out and it wasn't an ocean it was fire and Jesus says the fire is not quenched and the worm does not die meaning that it is eternal EX external and internal torment the idea of having worms Eternal external and internal torment we say every week some version of this world's broken and marred by sin and we know that judgment is coming this is what we're talking about there's an eternity of torment and we believe that that there's an eternity of life.
Joy and there's an eternity of torment and unending destruction so let's read the list as for the Cowardly so those who gave in those who stood by those who retreated those who should have spoken but didn't those who should have St stood up but sat down the Cowardly the faithless those who should have believed those who should have held on those who should have stuck it out but didn't the detestable those who chose sin and wickedness those who got so used to it they ceased to.
Notice it those who said well this is what our culture is like and participated because it didn't stand out as for murderers narrowly defined as those who actively on their own took life were broadly defined took a life that shouldn't be taken were broadly defined is those who do not love life cherish life value life which would make us need to consider our view of The Unborn or the times that we flippantly say things like I wish we would just bomb them off the map the sexually immoral those who chose to give in to their own desires to pursue sexual sin not acknowledging the value the weight the beauty that.
God gave to it the fences and guard rails that he put around it not acknowledging his will or his design but choosing what we wanted satisfying and gratifying our own desires the sexually immoral Sorcerers those who threw the use of drugs spells intentional Desir to gain power a rebellion against God's good design for the world and unwillingness to submit to his will a pursuit of demonic and evil Powers have tried to gain control which just so you know as westerners we were tracking with the list until we saw sorcerer which might mean that you undervalue or misunderstand the actual power of demonic influence in the world World idolators those who worship something else other than.
God pay homage to it bow down to it run after it some of that would be visible intentional like a totem pole or a statue or a shrine some of that would just be the effort that we put into pursuing something that doesn't have the image of God on it but has the IM image of Benjamin Franklin on it and we've told ourselves this will satisfy this will fill me up this will make life good this is what's worth worshiping pursuing something that was created rather than the Creator as our Supreme desire and all liars those who do not stand with the truth do not trust.
God and ultimately reject the truth of Christ their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur which is the second death that we should ask what's the difference what did they do what did they do how how does one get to be in this one or that one just so you know every person in this room will be at that will meting every person in this room will receive one of those inheritances every person you know every person who's ever existed every person who has the stamp of the image of.
God on them will receive one of those what's the difference because I think if we're honest we're in that list you you want to you want to negotiate with the list how much to what extent how cowardly how faithless how much sexual sin do it just one put you on the list or is it like a lot is it like a percentage and if you wanted to just say well I guess the opposite would be true so it would be the Brave the faithful the pure The Honorable those who worship the.
Lord and the Lord alone and did not give into idolatry like you would want to say it's just the opposite but if you do that if it's just the opposite then you have to perfectly uphold the positive version because any one of the negative versions will drop you into the other list so what's the distinction in the text he who was Seated on the throne said behold I am making all things new also he said write this down for these words are trustworthy and true and he said to me it is done I'm the alpha and the Omega the beginning and the end to the Thirsty I will give from the spring of the Water.
Of Life without payment to the thirsty Praise Jesus not to the good not to the holy not to the moral not to those who succeed at besting the list that is coming to the Thirsty I will give of the spring of the Water of Life without payment you see we want to make payments something in our souls demands payment that we would have to somehow pay for this and we're not wrong payment is needed but Jesus makes the payment and we get to receive it by being thirsty what you bring to the table is need and nothing else you bring sin you bring your resume that looks a lot like that list that we just.
Read and you say I'm thirsty I need you because if you don't forgive I'm not for for given and if you don't give Mercy I won't receive mercy and if you don't pay for this I can't pay for this I'm dry I'm parched I'm thirsty and that's what he says if you're thirsty line up you can drink freely this is not something that's just said here this is a promise that was coming God speaking through Isaiah the prophet says this come everyone who thirsts come to the waters and he who has no money come by and eat we would say I I don't have I can't do it I'm not good enough I don't have.
The payment he says come you ever had someone say like come we're going to eat and you said I don't have any money they said I'll pay for you and then you went and ate so he's saying come I can't do it no come come buy wine and milk without money and without price why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and your your labor for that which does not satisfy why are you chasing after things that ultimately will fail you come come receive your heart's desire.
Listen diligently to me and eat what is good Delight yourselves in rich food incline your ear and come to me hear that your soul may live this isn't just food food wine wine no that your soul made live I will make with you an Everlasting Covenant my steadfast sure love for David that the promise that's made to David that's fulfilled in Christ gets made to us that's how we become sons that we're welcomed in that he's accomplished this through Jesus and it is Everlasting paid.
For by him he goes in verse six he says seek the Lord while he may be found call upon him while he is near let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts let him return to the Lord that he may have compassion on him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon you turn to him and you say I have need I need forgiveness if you would to look at me right now and say but I've done.
So much bad stuff I've been so wrong I would say he abundantly Pardons and I would say it's not about you it's about him look look at this John 7 this is Jesus on the last day of the feast the great day so Jesus had a feast with all the Jewish people Jesus stood up and cried out if anyone thirsts let him come to me and drink whoever believes in me as the Scripture has said out of his heart will flow rivers of Living Water.
Now this he said about the spirit whom those who believed in him were to receive for as of yet the spirit has not been given because Jesus was not yet glorified you are a creature and your freedom comes from self-forgetfulness it comes in Christ that you would believe in him that you would come and not say here's what I've done here's how it's about me here's what I've accomplished here's how I'm weak here's how I'm cowardly here's how I'm sinful here's how I'm marred and broken and weighed down by sexual sin and idolatry here's all the ways I've run you don't come talking about you you don't come proclaiming your glory your goodness your ability.
You don't come with a resume you come and you say I believe in you I believe it's about you I believe that you're the beginning and the end I believe that you're the one who's made the payment and I believe that my hope is in you and I believe that if I'm going to receive forgiveness it's going to come from you I'm going to get Mercy from you I'm going to get wholeness from you and it's going to be to the glory and the praise of.
Jesus that I am rescued it's about him and we get to be free all you get to be is thirsty that's the invitation Revelation 22:17 the spirit and the bride say come and let the one who hears say come and let the one who is thirsty come let the one who desires take the Water of Life without price do you desire forgiveness do you desire Mercy do you desire rescue do you desire to have the fullness of God for eternity do you desire to belong to him do you desire to have your soul fixed do you desire.
Then come and say I'm thirsty I need you I believe in you I don't believe in me I Believe In You Church family if you've trusted in Jesus there is not a Christian who is not thirsty meaning that there will not be a time when you have fully come to where you don't need him you don't long for him anymore you don't thirst for him anymore you don't need forgiveness anymore you're well behaved enough that you don't show up on that list it does not at some point shift to you we stay thirsty needing his forgiveness needing his grace needing his Redemption.
And then none of those labels stick to us because of the work of Christ you aren't on that list if you belong to Jesus and not because of you but because of him it's been paid without price from you it's been paid by him but we stay thirsty meaning we continue to repent we'll always have a need for repentance and we'll always continue to say Lord I need you I need your grace I need your mercy it will stay about him it will not shift to being about you.
And if you don't know Jesus if you've never trusted in Jesus there's a story in second Kings chapter 5 I love this story there's a Syrian commander of an army named non and he is more powerful than you he's just conquered Israel and he has leprosy so he has all the all the wealth that his country can provide all the power that his country can provide he's got everything that he could possibly have at this point and he's dying he has leprosy he's going to die he finds out that there is a prophet in Israel and in a roundabout way he.
Finally makes it to Elisha he's ready to pay he's ready to prove his value he's ready to prove his worth he's ready to to offer what he can offer Elisha doesn't even come out to see him Elisha just sends his servant out there and he says hey we know why you're here Elisha said go dip yourself in the Jordan River seven times and you'll be clean he's offended he says we have better rivers in Syria and he goes to leave and his servant stops him and says hold on did he really just say wash and be clean why would you not do that did he really tell you something as wonderful as wash and be.
Clean why would you not do that so he goes and does it and his leprosy is gone y'all did the one seated on the throne really just say if you're thirsty come did he really just say do you have need because it's about his generosity it's about his grace it's about his forgiveness it's about his goodness and he just announces if you need if you're broken if you're thirsty if you've been longing and never satisfied come to me and you will be fully eternally satisfied why would we not come why would we not do that and Christian who believe this why would you not continually turn to him and say thank you.
For your mercy thank you for your grace thank you for your Redemption Lord I thirst and I long for you because I will never never earn this if you don't trust in Jesus and you're planning on leaving today or if this seems offensively simple I would just say did he really just say come and you'll have life why would you not come let's pray father we ask Lord I ask in the name of Jesus Jesus that around this room right now that your spirit would be at work that.
For the person who is wrestling with you that they would surrender for the Christian that feels weighed down by their sin that they would confess that they would see that they're trying to satisfy themselves with something else that they would confess and that they would feel the the mercy and the grace and the Redemption and the Hope in the work of Jesus Lord I pray that we would believe and that we would drink deeply from Life in Jesus name amen the band's going to come back up and in a moment we're going to sing together and as best we can as a Church family we're going to forget ourselves and try to have a a.
Taste of being swept up in something bigger than us fixing our eyes on a glorious God but where you are right now I would just say if you're thirsty if you haven't yet surrendered to the Lord if you haven't yet you've been chasing everything else come to him and say I Believe In You Jesus and I need your help I need your forgiveness and if you're a Christian and you've been wandering from him or you've been feeling overwhelmed by your sin or you've been seeing sin in your life and wondering how am I not going to fail how am I not going to fall that you would come and say.
Lord help me to endure and help me to thirst and help me to long and Lord get me to the end because it's all about you let's sing.