1 Samuel 23-24
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. We'll continue to walk through First Samuel. We're going to be in chapter 23 and 24 today, so you'll walk through those two chapters together.
In high school I played baseball and my freshman year we won state. Going into sophomore year, our senior class was kind of a little bit big headed. Before the season started, you had to pass a conditioning test called the country mile. It's about a four and a half mile run. Our seniors decided that because of where our coach was positioned—he parked his truck and the school was out in the country—it just was a run where you're running down that stop sign and back and around the school near the cow field. They realized that he didn't have visibility in every part of the run, so they thought, we're going to take some shortcuts. We're not going to run the full four and a half miles. We're going to shortcut here, here, and here.
When you're 15, 16, 17, you're dumb; you're not thinking through things. We thought we were because we thought, here's what we'll do. We'll all bunch up together here and we'll release here. We had a guy on our team who was about 300 pounds, so we didn't think through that he needed to be way back and finish way late. Our coach picked up pretty quickly that we were cheating. He saw the times and said this is very curious that the biggest guy on our team is running a seven and a half minute mile pace.
They finally said, all right, you guys have been running so well and doing so good. Like a cross country team, I've got your times, and that's the time you have to pass in order to make it on the baseball field. If you pass it, you go straight to the baseball field, but twice a week you have to make this run and then go to the field. He said, all right, now it's time to do it. Here are your times. We positioned all the coaches at every part of the run to see how good you were.
We quickly learned that cutting this race short and taking the shortcuts was a terrible decision. For weeks as we tried to make those times, I was one of the faster guys. It was like 28 minutes. I'm not a cross country runner; I'm not going to make close to six-minute pace for four and a half miles. I'll finish that story later and what happened. But I learned there, and I think we learn in life, that shortcuts are not good. They are short-sighted. We take them because we think that's ultimately what is good, that if we take the quickest route to get what we want, that's what's best. It's our own nature to trust in our own instincts and to actually not trust in the Lord, when oftentimes He lays out the more difficult road, a difficult path filled with suffering and difficult obedience.
Today we're in the part of David's story that feels, when you're in chapter 23, that for years he's been on the run for his life and he's been through trials and suffering and betrayal and the threat of death. He's been in it. But when we shift into chapter 24, he's going to have an option, a shortcut to the throne. We're going to see how this plays out and what this means for the Christian life as we consider what it means to have a long life of obedience to our Lord, even when it is difficult.
Let me pray, and then we'll walk through this together.
Heavenly Father, I pray that You would help us receive Your word as we walk through these chapters to see Your truth. God, I pray that we would not just be hearers of the Word, but doers of the Word, responding in faith and repentance and ultimately delighting in You above all things. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.
All right, so verse 1:
"Now they told David, Behold, the Philistines are fighting against Keilah and are robbing the threshing floors."
We pick up where we left off last week, where David and his men are on the run. They just heard about the priest of Nob being slaughtered for proceeding to help them out. They're feeling the threat of death. At this point, they hear of a town called Keilah, a town in Judah on the border between Philistine's land and the people of Judah, and they're being robbed by the Philistines.
Verse 2:
"Therefore David inquired of the Lord, Shall I go and attack these Philistines? And the Lord said to David, Go and attack the Philistines and save Keilah."
David gives us an example here of what it looks like to walk with God. He sees a difficulty. He asks the Lord. The Lord responds, and he's willing to do it. But his men hear this and have questions.
Verse 3:
"But David's men said to him, Behold, we are afraid here in Judah. How much more then if we go to Keilah against the armies of the Philistines?"
Which is a legitimate question, because if they go into Keilah, they expose themselves. They've been hiding in caves throughout the land. To go and help this town, chances are Saul will hear about it and come. It might be a situation where they're fighting the Philistines and Saul’s army is coming. This seems risky.
So David goes back to the Lord.
Verse 4:
"Then David inquired of the Lord again, and the Lord answered him, Arise, go down to Keilah, for I will give the Philistines into your hand."
David and his men went to Keilah, fought the Philistines, brought away their livestock, and struck them a great blow. David saved the inhabitants of Keilah.
Verse 6:
"When Abiathar the son of Ahimelech had fled to David at Keilah, he had come down with an ephod in hand."
Abiathar was the remaining priest from the priest of Nob story last week. He comes and brings an ephod. Ephods are priestly garments that priests wore, but this is probably the main ephod that the high priest wore. This is important because in it were two stones—the Urim stone and the Thummim stone. We don't know for sure how they were used, but they generally helped answer prayers in a yes or no fashion, like, should we go here or there? The priest did some type of pulling out or casting of stones.
Verse 7:
"Now, it was told Saul that David had come to Keilah, and Saul said, God has given him into my hand, for he has shut himself in by entering a town that has gates and bars."
Saul finally hears about it and says, aha, I’ve got them. They're in Keilah, a place with gates and bars. We'll stop the men there and finally take David down.
Verse 8:
"Saul summoned all the people to go to war, to go down to Keilah to besiege David and his men. David knew that Saul was plotting harm against him."
He says to Abiathar the priest, bring the ephod here.
Verse 9:
"Then David said, O Lord, the God of Israel, your servant has surely heard that Saul seeks to come to Keilah to destroy the city on my account. Will the men of Keilah surrender me into his hand? Will Saul come down, as your servant has heard, O Lord, God of Israel, please tell your servant."
They seek the Lord, asking if the city will betray them after David’s protection.
Verse 11:
"And the Lord said, He will come down. Then David said, Will the men of Keilah surrender me and my men into the hand of Saul? And the Lord said, They will surrender you."
David and his men, about 600 now, arose and departed from Keilah and went wherever they could go. They asked the question, should we trust Keilah? The answer was no, as you see from the Lord's response.
When Saul was told that David escaped Keilah, he gave up the expedition. David remained in the strongholds in the wilderness, in the hill country of the wilderness of Ziph. Saul sought him every day, but God did not give him into his hand.
David saw that Saul had come to seek his life. David was in the wilderness of Ziph at Horesh. Jonathan, Saul's son, rose and went to David at Horesh and strengthened his hand. He said:
"Do not fear for the hand of Saul. My father shall not find you. You shall be king over Israel, and I shall be next to you."
Saul, my father, also knows this. The two of them made a covenant before the Lord. David remained at Horesh and Jonathan went home.
Jonathan, David's friend, hears about these troubles and encourages him. From Psalm 34, which was written while David was in the cave fearing his life, we know the Lord is near the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. David, on the run for his life with deep discouragement, has this friend encouraging him.
This encounter is significant because Jonathan has hopefulness. He says, one day you’ll be king, and I’ll be beside you. This foreshadows that Jonathan will never see David be king; he will not live to see him on the throne. This is their final encounter. Jonathan, in his last friendship act, encourages David, telling him not to fear and to trust God's promises.
Verse 19:
"Then the Ziphites went up to Saul at Gibeah saying, Is not David hiding among us in the strongholds at Horesh, on the hill of Akilah, which is south of Jeshimon? Now come down, O king, according to all your heart’s desire to come down, and our part shall be to surrender him into the king’s hand."
Saul said:
"May you be blessed by the Lord for you have had compassion on me. Go make yet more sure. Know and see the place where his foot is and who has seen him there, for he is very cunning. See and take note of all the lurking places where he hides, and come back to me with sure information."
They went ahead to Ziph as spies.
If you read Psalm 54, David expresses his distress at this betrayal by his own countrymen:
"For strangers have risen up against me; ruthless men seek my life; they do not set God before themselves."
David is deeply discouraged by continual betrayal, even from people of Judah.
David and his men were in the wilderness of Maon, about five miles south of Ziphara in the Arabah. Saul and his men went to seek him. David went down to the rock and lived in the wilderness of Maon. When Saul heard that, he pursued David there. Saul went on one side of the mountain and David and his men on the other side.
David was hurrying to get away from Saul, who was closing in to capture them.
A messenger then told Saul:
"Hurry and come, for the Philistines have made a raid against the land."
Saul returned from pursuing David and went against the Philistines. Therefore that place was called the Rock of Escape. David then lived in the strongholds of En Gedi.
At the last moment when Saul was about to capture David, God sovereignly intervened. Saul did what a king should do and protected his people, and God preserved David’s life again.
Chapter 23 gives us more examples of David continually facing the threat of death and betrayal. Think—he escaped death at Nob, at Ziph, at Maon, at Gath, and at Keilah. This is years of hunting, suffering, and fear. Every time trying to go to sleep, hearing a branch break, wondering, is it the day? Years of hardship and trauma under the threat of constant death.
This sets up First Samuel 24, where David has the opportunity to end it.
Verse 1:
"When Saul returned from following the Philistines, he was told, Behold, David is in the wilderness of En Gedi. Then Saul took 3,000 chosen men out of Israel and went to seek David and his men in front of the Wild Goats Rocks."
Saul handles the Philistine raid, then he finds that David is near Wild Goats Rocks, basically a rocky hill where wild goats live.
The story takes an interesting turn.
Verse 3:
"He came to the sheepfolds, where there was a cave. Saul went in to relieve himself. David and his men were sitting in the innermost parts of the cave."
Saul goes into the cave to use the bathroom, for privacy. David and 600 of his men are hiding inside that cave, which hopefully gives you an idea of how big it was.
David’s men were very excited because Saul was most vulnerable now, when using the bathroom. This was a moment on a silver platter—David and his men could have ended all the hardship with one swing of the sword.
Verse 4:
"And the men of David said to him, Here is the day of which the Lord said to you, Behold, I will give your enemy into your hand, and you shall do to him as it shall seem good to you."
They urged David to take this opportunity.
David rose stealthily and cut off a corner of Saul's robe. He could have ended it all but instead cut a piece of his robe.
Verse 5:
"And afterward David's heart struck him because he had cut off a corner of Saul's robe. He said to his men, The Lord forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the Lord's anointed, to put out my hand against him, seeing he is the Lord's anointed."
David persuaded his men not to attack Saul.
Saul rose and left the cave, going on his way.
David knew God’s heart and the heart of the king. Saul was the Lord's anointed king, even if evil had been done. David would not decide when Saul’s kingship ends. He trusted the Lord and obeyed, not murdering a man while he was vulnerable.
His men, who have been under the threat of death for years, followed his example. That shows David's leadership.
After Saul left the cave, David boldly confronted him.
Verse 8:
"David arose and went out of the cave and called after Saul, My lord the king."
Saul looked back. David bowed with his face to the earth and paid homage.
David said:
"Why do you listen to the words of men who say, Behold, David seeks your harm? Behold this day your eyes have seen how the Lord gave you today into my hand in the cave. Some told me to kill you, but I spared you. I said, I will not put out my hand against the Lord, for he is the Lord's anointed."
David pleaded:
"See, my father, see the corner of your robe in my hand. I cut off the corner and did not kill you. You may know and see that there is no wrong or treason in my hands. I have not sinned against you, though you hunt my life to take it."
He called out:
"May the Lord judge between me and you. May the Lord avenge me against you, but my hand shall not be against you."
He even said:
"Out of the wicked comes wickedness, but my hand shall not be against you. After whom has the king of Israel come out? After a dead dog, after a flea? May the Lord therefore be judge and give sentence between me and you, and see to it and plead my cause and deliver me from your hand."
David showed that he would not sin to get what God promised. He humbly lowered himself to be insignificant—a dead dog, a flea—and pleaded with Saul to see that he was not the enemy.
Verse 16:
"As soon as David had finished speaking these words to Saul, Saul said, Is this your voice, my son David? Saul lifted up his voice and wept. He said, You are more righteous than I, for you repaid me good, whereas I have repaid you evil. You have declared this day how you have dealt well with me and that you did not kill me when the Lord put me into your hands."
Saul has moments of clarity and contrition. He weeps and realizes David is the better man.
There's a cool link to Judah and Tamar back in Genesis 38, a picture of having evidence in hand and declaring righteousness.
Saul continued:
"Now behold, I know that you shall surely be king, that the kingdom of Israel shall be established in your hands. Swear to me by the Lord that you will not cut off my offspring after me, and that you will not destroy my name out of my father's house."
David swore to this.
Saul went home; David and his men went up to the stronghold.
Saul finally sees it: David will be king. He pleads for the protection of his offspring, as it was common in history for successors to kill rival family members.
When you think about chapters 23 and 24 back to back, you see how long David suffered and how many years of hardships he endured. He had the opportunity right then to end all his hardships with one swing of the sword and take the throne. But he did not. He trusted the Lord and was obedient to the will of the Father.
This is a beautiful picture of trust in God.
It's also a foreshadowing of the more righteous path of Christ.
Jesus also would be offered a shortcut to the throne during His temptation in the wilderness.
In Matthew 4:
"The devil took Him to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. He said to Him, All these I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.
Then Jesus said to him, Begone, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve."
Jesus was offered the throne but rejected the shortcut because He trusted the will of the Father, even when that road was filled with suffering—the road to the cross.
Jesus suffered agony, physical pain, separation from the Father as the full cup of God's wrath bore down on Him.
Even when Jesus was suffering, He could have called down angels to end it, but He did not.
He endured to the final breath, with redemption in mind for us.
When He finished His work on the cross, He ascended to the right hand of God, where He rules over all kingdoms forever.
Amen.
Going back to 10th grade, when we were running this unreasonable time every day before practice, it was clear we were never going to make our times.
Finally, our coach said, all right, I’m going to bump up the time to what it should have been.
You smaller guys got 32 minutes, which was a pretty steady pace.
I hate running. To this day you won’t see me running; I’m not a runner. I don’t want to be a runner.
Because I hated running so much, I was determined to make the time. I ran faster than I ever had in my life. I was blazing fast.
Coming around the final turn, about a quarter of a mile left, my coach said, you’re not going to make it.
I sprinted, after running four-ish miles, with everything I had.
The final few steps before the finish line, I puked. Then I puked walking across the finish line because I was not going to miss this time.
He said 29 minutes.
I was like, are you kidding me? I could have walked.
What we failed to see about this conditioning test was we could only see what was right in front of us—a stupid run we had to do.
You may think, why do baseball players have to run? It’s because of endurance for the season.
When you play 30 games in high school, 60 plus in college, or 162 in pro baseball, you have to get in shape, or your body will break down mid-season.
At 15, you don’t see what the coach is doing. You don’t see that the suffering he puts you through over and over again is for a greater good, so you can make it through the season and not break down.
We didn’t trust our coaches. We saw what was good in our minds, so we took the shortcut.
But that’s what we do all the time in life. We see the easier option right in front of us and want to take it.
We have wonderful examples from Scripture about what it looks like to be obedient and how good that is.
David could have taken a shortcut to the throne, but didn’t.
Jesus was obedient to the Father, even through suffering, for our redemption.
We have wonderful examples of the long road of obedience, even when it’s difficult.
So the question today: What shortcuts are we tempted to take?
In business or work, we know shortcuts: how to cut corners, how to cheat.
We see others do it and wonder why we have to do it the right way.
But God calls us to integrity and obedience for our good.
In relationships, it’s common now to simulate marriage without the covenant.
Living as if married, moving in together, enjoying pleasures without commitment.
It’s hard to be obedient in that and honor the Lord.
But God has good for us when we trust Him in obedience.
We fail to see that when we take shortcuts.
Some feel a desire for vengeance when they've been wronged.
Shortcut is to take vengeance ourselves.
God calls us to trust Him for justice, which is far better.
In parenting, there are shortcuts.
Moments needing patience, control of emotions.
Shortcut is to lose control or discipline wrongly.
In marriage, conflict, and other struggles, shortcuts abound.
We often coach people to confront, to avoid gossip, to be faithful to God’s calls.
Some suffer deeply and may see shortcuts like substances, self-harm, or worse.
We cannot see the long obedience God calls us to.
As you consider today, what shortcut options are you taking when God calls you to obedience?
My hope is we consider David’s actions and the better David, Jesus Christ, and follow their lead.
Matt will come up and lead us in one final song.
As he comes, don’t shift or move, just listen.
The wrong response to the call is to say, "I’m going to do this by my strength," trying to muscle obedience.
The response is to look to Jesus.
Hebrews 12 says this after chapter 11:
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race set before us,
looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God."
Our example is to look to Christ, put our hope in Him, who endured the cross and now rules from heaven.
May we first look to Christ by grace through faith and be people who trust God every step in obedience.
Let me pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray that You would help us hear the good news of the Gospel that calls us to trust You, so that we might not take the shortcuts in life that do not bring joy, honor You, or bring good to us or those around us.
God, I pray for faithfulness, but that it comes by first trusting in You.
We have failed, sinned, and chosen shortcuts.
May You cover us in grace, by Your grace, through the blood of Jesus shed for us.
May we leave here as a people obedient to You, even when it is hard.
In Jesus' name, Amen.
1 Samuel 21-22
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning, my name's Chet, I'm one of the pastors here. If you will grab your Bible and go to First Samuel, chapter 21. We're going to be in chapters 21 and 22 today. We're looking through both of those chapters.
When I was growing up, probably three to five, I think I watched Mary Poppins 42,000 times. I'm pretty sure that we only had like a handful of VHS that my grandmother had recorded from her television. So I also have a lot of commercials really, really memorized. But I watched that on a regular basis. And there's this scene towards the end of the movie where the children had been in a bank and there was some bank trouble. And I don't want to get into a whole discussion of finance, but they had to run out of the bank and they get lost in London. And thus begins a series of back to back to back to back moments that were utterly terrifying to me.
It was like they took all the vulnerabilities of a four year old and just pummeled them. So they're lost in a city. Terrifying. Just not knowing where your parents are for like 12 seconds when you're four and five is scary. They're running through a city. This is, you know, it's awful. Then they come around a corner in an alleyway and an old lady pops out and goes, come with me, children. And it's like, why would she do that? And you don't know if she was intending to be helpful. They run away. She seemed scary. So they take off. Then they come around a corner and a dog jumps out and starts barking aggressively at them. When you're a child, a dog is the size of a bear. Like, I mean, you know. Then they turn and they run and they go down an alleyway and a shadowy figure grabs them. Turns out that that's their friend, but you don't know it at the time.
I just remember like this seared in my brain, this series of events. And I remember even as a little kid, like, I'm pretty sure there were times where I just stopped watching the movie before that I was like, well, let's move on. I know they make it at the. And I think there were other times where I just left the room and like waited till I heard the song start back up, you know, because it's a children's movie where things are supposed to be happy. And then I returned, but it was really this interesting peek into things that made me feel very vulnerable and very alone. And this real dive into fears that I had.
As we're reading through this text today, we're going to see how Saul, David and a handful of other people deal with fear. What it does to them, where it takes them. There's a reality to fear, that it drives us towards something, towards someone, it exposes us in a way. And so what I hope we see in this text is we're going to see them as they interact with it. They're going to see how they handle it. And what I hope we'll learn together is the scariest place to be and the safest place to be as we study this text together.
So let's pray quickly for us and then we'll move into chapter 21 of First Samuel. Lord, we ask for your help. We ask for your Spirit to speak in a way that we can understand, that you would help us to deal with our fears and to see what fear does to us in a way that draws us to you. In Jesus name, amen.
So David's on the run. Saul wants to kill him. Saul's the king. David was very close to Saul, was a general, was his bodyguard, was all these different things. And he's now having to flee for his life. And that's what we saw last week as Jonathan, Saul's son, helped David escape.
Chapter 21.
Then David came to Nob, to Ahimelech the priest. So he goes to Nob, and we're going to find out that Nob is a whole city of priests. It seems as if after everything, after Shiloh was destroyed and the ark was taken, they get the ark back, and it seems like now the center of the priesthood is here. It's unclear whether the ark is also here, but the priests are. And this is where priestly activities will be taking place for the people of Israel, the sacrifices and all that.
So he goes there to Ahimelech the priest. And Ahimelech came to meet David, trembling, and said to him,
"Why are you alone and no one with you?"
So it's odd for David to be by himself. Ahimelech knows David, but David usually has like a whole crew. He's either with the king, he's with his military units that he's overseeing. For David just to show up is what business does he have? Did something terrible happen? What's going on?
So he comes out, that's why he's trembling. And he says, what? What's going on? And David said to Ahimelech, the priest,
"The king has charged me with a matter and said to me, 'Let no one know anything of the matter about which I send you and with which I have charged you.' And I have made an appointment with the young men for such and such a place. Now then, what do you have on hand? Give me five loaves of bread or whatever is here."
So David just says, secret king business. And I've got some people that I'm definitely meeting who are real at a very specific place that you can't know about, and I need bread. None of that is true, except for that David wants bread, but he's on the run and he is just trying to get out of here.
And the priest answered, David,
"I have no common bread on hand, but there is holy bread if the young men have kept themselves from women,"
which just has to do with sexual activity, makes you unclean in the law. So that's what that is. It's not just like women, some mean thing about them. It just has to do with sexual activity.
David answered the priest,
"Truly, women have been kept from us. As always, when I go on an expedition, the vessels of the young men are holy, even when it is an ordinary journey. How much more today will their vessels be holy?"
So the priest gave him the holy bread, for there was no bread there, but the bread of the Presence which is removed from before the Lord to be replaced by hot bread on the day that it is taken away.
So the tabernacle seems to be here, the bread of the Presence is here. They would set it out on the Sabbath before the Lord as a picture of the meal, the connection, the communion that we have with the Lord, that they have with the Lord. And then they would rotate it out on the Sabbath. And the old loaves were allowed to be eaten by the priests. And Ahimelech breaks that rule to give to David in a time of need.
Jesus references this and says that he did right, that this was correct to do, to break a ceremonial law for the sake of caring for someone. And he says this in this argument with the Pharisees about the Sabbath, saying that some things were built for our good and our blessing, and therefore, if there's opposition, we can bless others in those moments. And that's what he's talking about.
So David takes that bread and he now has five loaves of bread that was the bread of the Presence, but the priest is allowing him to have it.
Verse 7.
Now, a certain man of the servants of Saul was there that day, detained before the Lord. His name was Doeg, the Edomite, the chief of Saul's herdsmen, he's detained before the Lord. It may be a Sabbath if they've just swapped the bread out. So it's possible he wasn't allowed to travel very long. It's also possible he's doing some sort of thing because he's an Edomite to become a follower of God. It's also possible that he has some sort of sickness or skin disease and he's having to be watched because there's all these. These are several of the reasons why you might be detained before the Lord. He could also just be there doing some, basically, some holy days for himself as he worships the Lord.
But that's it. That's all it tells us about him. It just in the middle of this story goes, hey, Doeg, the Edomite is here. And it's going to go right back to the story. And that's foreshadowing. So remember him, he'll show up later, but he doesn't do anything here.
Verse 8.
Then David said to Ahimelech,
"Then have you not here a spear or a sword at hand? For I have brought neither my sword nor my weapons with me because the king's business required haste."
And the priest said,
"The sword of Goliath, the Philistine, whom you struck down in the Valley of Elah. Behold, it is here wrapped in a cloth behind the Ephod, if you will. Take that, take it, for there's none but that here."
And David said,
"There is none like that. Give it to me."
So David says, I was in such a hurry, I don't even have any weapons. Do you have any weapons? He says, you gave us Goliath's sword. It's still here. And David says, great, that sword is awesome. I will take it. And so he has a nice, probably fairly large sword that he leaves with.
Verse 10.
And David rose and fled that day from Saul and went to Achish, the king of Gath.
Okay, David doesn't have any options. That's what this just told us. The plan that he's come up with is, I'm going to show up to Gath with Goliath of Gath's sword and see how that goes. It seems like he's intending to maybe be like a mercenary. He's just going to go there and serve there. He's absolutely on the run from his home, his people, his everything.
And the servants of Achish said to him, to Achish,
"Is not this David, the king of the land? Did they not sing to one another of him in dances? Saul has struck down his thousands and David his ten thousands."
So if David was planning on being undercover, he shows up and they're like, mmm. And they go to the king and they're like, I'm pretty sure they have a song about how good he is at murdering us. I'm pretty sure that's him.
And David took those words, these words to heart. So he somehow overheard this. In this situation, was much afraid of Achish, the king of Gath. So he changed his behavior before them, pretended to be insane in their hands and made marks on the doors of the gate and let his spittle run down his beard.
So somehow, on his way before the king, he just starts acting insane, drooling, marking up the walls. That's the best disguise he can come up with on the fly, you guys. And it works.
Then Achish said to his servants,
"Behold, you see, the man is mad. Why then have you brought him to me? Do I lack mad men that you've brought this fellow to behave as a madman in my presence? Shall this fellow come into my house?"
So they're like, hey, we've got David. And then he goes, you brought a crazy person here. Thank you so much. Did you think that was what I really needed? I needed those.
Some of y'all like to memorize verses for specific situations that you can remind, you know, rehearse yourself or say to other people. Maybe this one for, like, when your family's coming over for vacation or something, or your in-laws are coming and you can just quote to your spouse,
"Do we lack mad men in their house? Are we gonna let this fellow in just for y'all?"
Bible memorization, you're welcome. Probably won't be one of our monthly verses, but it's a good one.
All right, chapter 22.
David departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam.
So David then leaves. He heads back over into Israelite territory and hides in King Achish's. So his plan to go to Gath does not work and he escapes. Now, an interesting thing happens as we get to follow this story and as we have the whole revelation of the Scriptures, because this text doesn't tell us a lot of what's going on with David, what he's thinking. We just hear what he's doing. We hear some of what he says, but we don't get to see what's going on with him.
And so far, in the midst of fear, he's just run and he's come up with what arguably is an ill-advised plan to run to Gath. But that's all he comes up with. He ends up in this cave. But in the book of Psalms we have songs and poems and worship that David writes. And there's one that has this inscription above it. It says, this is Psalm 34. It says of David when he changed his behavior before Abimelech, so that he drove him out and he went away.
Now this text calls him Achish, which seems to be a title, and Abimelech seems to be his name. So like if you said he was in front of Caesar and then later it says Nero, it's the same guy. So Achish and Abimelech.
So we actually get to hear what, how David responds after this moment when he gets to escape. And so it seems like he wrote this while in the cave or on his way to it. He starts off in the first four verses, worshiping, praising. He says,
"I sought the Lord, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed. This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him and delivers them."
So he says, I had fear and he rescued me. And those who fear the Lord he protects. So David's interaction with fear is shifting here. He's saying, in my fear I began to go to the Lord, and now I fear him. He's the most fearful, so he's been on the run. It doesn't seem like he's handled everything so well so far. But now, as everything slows down, as he's trying to process through this, and he's worshiping the Lord for rescuing him out of Gath, this is what he's writing.
Verse 8,
"Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Oh, fear the Lord, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack."
He keeps going.
Verse 18,
"The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit."
In verse 22 he says,
"The Lord redeems the life of his servants. None of those who take refuge in him will be condemned."
This is how he ends it. So he says, I'm hiding in him. I'm taking refuge in him. My hope is in him. That's David as he deals with this fear.
So chapter 22, let's pick back up in the text.
David departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam. And when his brothers and all his father's house heard it, they went down there to him.
David on the run, hiding in a cave, trying to figure out what he's going to do, trying to lay low, writing some songs from his expert hiding place. He looks out one day, keeping a good lookout, and he's like, mom.
Because his whole family shows up. They all come to him, which makes sense. And maybe he had to go out for supplies. Maybe word spreads at some point where David is, but his whole family comes to him, which makes sense, because if David's on the run from Saul, they're probably not that safe from Saul. And Saul may go look to them to find David.
So they all go to David. Then it says this.
"And everyone who was in distress and everyone who was in debt and everyone who was bitter in soul gathered to him. And he became commander over them. And there were with him about 400 men."
So his mom, his brothers, his dad, they all show up. Then other people just start showing up. And it's like, why are you here? I am stressed beyond belief. Everything out there is terrible. I heard David was in a cave, and I thought, I'm gonna go get in that cave. Somebody else shows up. Why are you here? I owe so many people so much money. Cave started sounding pretty good. Everyone who's bitter in soul, so the most frustrated, angry people who are, they're not going to read, they're not going to vote for Saul when reelection time comes back around like, this hasn't worked for them. That's who's showing up to David. And then it says he becomes commander of them. So they showed up and they were like, everything is awful. And he's like, okay, do some push ups. It's time to start training. I guess y'all are gonna have to listen to what I say if you're hanging out in my cave. And they do. So now he has 400 distressed, bitter in soul people who owe a lot of money to other people. They're all with David now, plus his mom and his brothers and his dad, okay?
And David went from there to Mizpah of Moab. So now he leaves again. He takes all these people with him, it seems. And he said to the king of Moab,
"Please let my father and my mother stay with you till I know what God will do for me."
And he left them with the king of Moab, and they stayed with him all the time that David was in the stronghold.
So reading some commentaries on this, there was a couple of different ideas as to why the king of Moab would let him do that. Some of the things they put out were housing fugitives because the Moabites were enemies of the Israelites. So the king to house fugitives that are against Saul seems like maybe that's a good idea.
There's also just a general cultural thing of hospitality. So it's possible they're just doing what their culture does, which is show hospitality in these sort of situations.
There's a theory that it's possible that one of the reasons they went to Moab was that Jesse is the grandson of Ruth, who was from Moab. So there's some family connection here.
And I've come up with my own theory, which is that David showed up with 400 desperate men and said, hey, will you watch my mom? And they were like, sure. You and your friends gonna leave? He's like, we're gonna hang out a little bit, but just keep an eye on them until we figure out what's gonna happen.
So any one of those is possible as to why they've said yes to this, but they do say yes to this. David leaves his parents with the king of Moab, and he left them with the king of Moab, and they stayed with him all the time that David was in the stronghold.
Then the prophet Gad said to David,
"Do not remain in the stronghold. Depart and go into the land of Judah."
So he says, we're not going to stay in Moab. The Lord wants you to go back to Judah. And he does. And we're going to see Gad show up periodically through the story of David.
So David departed and went to the forest of Heref.
Now the story is going to shift to Saul. So we've seen David dealing with fear. We've seen him on the run, and we've seen him as this process is happening, growing in worship and saying, he's going to trust in the Lord.
And now we're going to see Saul as he deals with fear.
Verse 6.
Now, Saul heard that David was discovered and the men who were with him.
If you're playing hide and seek and someone finds you, you may not have had the best hiding spot. If your entire family finds you, plus 400 strangers, you don't have a good hiding spot.
So David now is discovered. They know he's out. They know kind of where he is. And he's got 400 people traveling around with him. And this news makes it to Saul. So he's no longer incognito. He's known.
Saul was sitting at Gibeah under the tamarisk tree on the height with his spear in his hand. And all his servants were standing about him, which first of all, of course he has a spear in his hand. He seems to always be holding a spear. But also what is happening in this text, it says he was sitting at Gibeah under the tamarisk tree on the height with his spear. And all his servants, all of those things are markers of leadership and kingship. That you would sit under an obvious tree, they would hold court there, they would answer questions there, they would judge there that he's on a height, that he's got servants, that he's holding his spear. So in some ways this text says Saul the king was out kinging in a very kingly way. That's kind of what that text is doing. It's building him up as much like he's super kinging. Right now. We got David hiding in a cave, wandering around other places, trying to figure out what he's going to do, hiding in a forest. And now we've got Saul, the kingiest king that ever did king.
And Saul said to his servants who stood about him here now,
"People of Benjamin."
Okay, that's interesting. Benjamin is the tribe that Saul is from. He's been king for a long time. He's been king over all of Israel for a long time. It's possible that he only always has kept just Benjaminites the closest to him. Or as he's grown more and more paranoid and more and more fearful, he's gotten rid of everybody who doesn't belong to his tribe and now has perfectly surrounded himself with Benjaminites. But either way, he's paranoid and fearful.
And we're going to hear from his speech how far that goes.
But these are only people from his clan. He's suspicious, fearful.
"Hear now, people of Benjamin, will the son of Jesse give every one of you fields and vineyards? Will he make you all commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds, that all of you have conspired against me?"
So he stands there and says, you just are so certain that David's gonna bless all of you, that he's gonna care for all of you, that you're all gonna be so important when he becomes king, that you've all conspired against me? And that's not true. But he now doubts everyone that's around him.
Still, in verse 8, he says,
"No one discloses to me when my son makes a covenant with the son of Jesse. None of you is sorry for me or discloses to me that my son has stirred up my servant against me to lie in wait, as at this day."
He is correct that Jonathan did make a covenant with David, but it was because they loved one another. It was a covenant of friendship to care for one another. They make a covenant that they're not going to harm each other. And Jonathan goes out of his way to keep his dad from sinning against David.
But he is not helping David lie in wait against Saul.
David isn't lying in wait against Saul. David's not out to get Saul. Saul's out to get David. Saul is actually not in danger, not from David, but he thinks he is. And he's saying, everyone's against me.
And Saul's entire world has shrunk to just him. It's just him. Everybody's an enemy. Everybody's in on it. Everything's a secret. Everything's falling apart.
Then answered Doeg, the Edomite, who stood by the servants of Saul,
"I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob to Ahimelech the son of Ahitub, and he inquired of the Lord for him and gave him provisions and gave him the sword of Goliath the Philistine."
We actually don't know if he inquired of the Lord from him. Our text doesn't tell us that. But Doeg says he did. But that's something you do before military stuff. He doesn't say he gave him five loaves of bread. He calls it provisions, just militarizing it up a little bit. And he gives him a sword. He basically says, hey, Ahimelech's in on it.
Then the king sent to summon Ahimelech the priest, the son of Ahitub and all his father's house. The priests who were at Nob and all of them came to the king. It would have taken a couple miles away, so to go get them to come back. This took a couple hours, but they all come.
And Saul said,
"Hear now, son of Ahitub?"
And he answered,
"Here I am, my lord."
And Saul said to him,
"Why have you conspired against me, you and the son of Jesse, in that you have given him bread and a sword and have inquired of God for him, so that he has risen against me to lie in wait as at this day?"
Then Ahimelech answered the king,
"And who among all your servants is as faithful as David, who is the king's son-in-law and captain over your bodyguard and honored in your house? Is today the first time that I have inquired of God for him? No. Let not the king impute anything to his servant or to all the house of my father, for your servant has known nothing of this, of all of this. Much or little."
So Ahimelech just says, it's David. David, your bodyguard, your son-in-law. I've done this. I do this. I would do this for him anytime he comes. I'm not in on something. I didn't know any of this. Don't add that to me. Don't add that to my family. That's not the case.
Aside from those noises, that's what he said. He may have said it really calmly, I don't know, but he just kind of lists out like five things in a row where he's just like, I didn't have anything to do with anything, and this is normal for me to do whatever David asks.
Verse 16.
And the king said,
"You shall surely die, Ahimelech. You and all your father's house."
And the king said to the guard who stood about him,
"Turn and kill the priests of the Lord, because their hand also is with David. They knew that he fled and did not disclose it to me."
But the servants of the king would not put out their hand to strike the priests of the Lord.
You got to hear the sentence that Saul said. He looks at his servants and says, that's it. Kill all the priests of the Lord because they're on David's team. Priests of the Lord. They're on David's team.
And then I don't know if y'all can see the fear and the frustration. And Saul's face turned purple as all of his soldiers are just like, nope, I'm not.
I love his soldiers in this moment because they all know there's going to be a day I stand before the Lord and it won't be Saul. There's a day that I will stand before my king and it isn't Saul. And I'm not going on record as killing a priest, it's not happening. You can kill me. That's fine. Then I'll go stand before the Lord and go, do you see me not kill that priest? Do you see what I just died for? Like, they just don't move.
And again, I'm sure this just confirms in Saul that everyone is against him. His whole world has shrunk down to his center of gravity and Doeg.
Then the king said to Doeg,
"You turn and strike down the priests."
And Doeg, the Edomite turned and struck down the priests. And he killed on that day 85 persons who wore the linen ephod. Doeg is an Edomite. He doesn't care.
So he kills them, 85 of them. They brought all the males from that household. They kill all of them. And Nob, the city of the priests, he put to the sword both man and woman, child and infant, ox, donkey and sheep. He put to the sword.
Saul does to the city of the priests what he was not willing to do to the Amalekites when it was for the Lord and it was holy war, he was unwilling to do it. When it's for him and it's his trying to keep his seat of power, he's willing to.
Verse 20.
But one of the sons of Ahimelech, the son of Ahitub, named Abiathar, escaped and fled to David.
Alright, so something very interesting has happened in this passage.
In chapter two, a man of God comes to Eli and says the priesthood is not going to stay with your family because you've dishonored me. He says they're going to be wiped out. There will only be left one who will cry his eyes out. That's what just happened. Abiathar is that one.
And eventually it's taken from him. He doesn't get to carry on serving the Lord. So the curse of God is poured out on this family through the wicked choices of Saul.
So Saul is very wrong to do what he does. But we also see the hand of God at work in fulfilling his promises. It's a very interesting thing that happens here. But it doesn't mean that Saul's right to do what he does. It just means that when God says something, it happens.
And Abiathar told David that Saul had killed the priests of the Lord.
And David said to Abiathar,
"I knew on that day when Doeg the Edomite was there, that he would surely tell Saul, I have occasioned the death of all the persons of your father's house."
David's response is, that's on me. While David was on the run, while David was doing what he did, he said, I knew that. I knew he was going to tell him. And I don't know if David fully understood what was going to come from that. I don't see how he could have. But he just says, yeah, that's. I'm the one to blame for this.
Verse 21,
"Stay with me. Do not be afraid for he who seeks my life seeks your life with me. You shall be in safekeeping."
So that's his response to Abiathar.
There's a very interesting call it a social phenomenon that's happening in this text. But everybody who's absolutely desperate is going to David. If everything has fallen apart, if you have no hope of a future, if everything has fallen around your ears, they go to David.
And I can't help but see that and see that that's exactly what happens in the New Testament with Jesus. That when Jesus is on earth, the people who flock to him are the poor, the destitute, the sinners, the weak, the small, the outcasts.
This actually is one of the things that he and the religious leaders get into arguments over all the time. They're like, you hang out with absolute human garbage. And Jesus is like, right, because the sick need a physician, not the well.
And there's this thing where if you really know that you're in need, you start looking for somewhere to go, some bit of hope, someone to run to.
And so we see in this story as it plays out that you have fear, legitimate, real, terrible fear, actual bad things.
And David, as we follow this out, he runs to the Lord and there's all of these people that run to David. And then there's Saul who tries to handle everything in his own strength.
And I told you earlier that we would see. I'm trying to tell you the scariest place to be.
The scariest place to be is where you are the biggest person in the world.
The scariest place to be is where you are utterly, completely, absolutely self-sufficient.
The scariest place to be is where the center of existence has boiled down to your center of gravity, where it's all up to you.
That's where Saul is.
Trust, no one believes, no one hopes in nothing, just whatever he can tooth and nail and claw and grab, whatever he can get done, all up to him.
And I don't know if you know it, but that's what our culture has told you over and over again is what you need to go do.
Express yourself, find yourself, succeed, accomplish, win, earn.
It's up to you.
The most powerful snowflake in the world that you've got to on your own. Be sufficient, be capable, be good.
That's what religion shows up and tells you so often is be good, be moral, do it. It's up to you.
That's terrifying.
The guards around Saul know something that we need to know is that one day you're going to stand before the real Lord, the real King.
And on that day you do not want to stand in yourself self-sufficient.
You do not want to stand before the King and say, judge me, evaluate me, I am big enough, I am good enough, I am capable.
That's terrifying.
You don't want to live your life that way.
And you certainly don't want to end your life that way.
We get to do with Jesus what Abiathar does with David and we get to have the same response.
We get to run to him and say, I have no hope anywhere but with you.
And what David says to Abiathar is what Jesus says to us.
Your life is connected to my life and with me you'll be in safekeeping.
That we get to hide ourselves in Christ.
That when he died for sins, he died for us.
That when he was buried, we were buried.
When he rose, we rise.
We get to be hidden in Christ and what he has accomplished.
And we get to stand before the Lord in Christ and not in ourselves and not in our sufficiency.
But we get to say, I have hidden in him.
And no one is put to shame who takes refuge in the Lord.
David prophetically says it at the end of his psalm.
"The Lord redeems the life of his servants. None of those who take refuge in him will be condemned."
And then we get to live like that in all the fears of life.
You get to go to the Lord. You get to do what David did. He's in the, he's in the cave and he's rehearsing.
You know how long it takes to write a song? It's possible that this just came out, but I think a lot of it is he's working on, he's rehearsing, he's remembering and he's reminding himself over and over and over and over again.
My hope is in you. My trust is in you. I have no good apart from you.
Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.
Nobody who is condemned, who places their hope in you.
Nobody who runs to you in refuge, oh, let me hide in you.
Over and over and over and over again.
And then we get to do the same thing that we don't in the middle of fear go, I must act, I've got to do something.
But we get to in the middle of the fear go, okay Lord, if you don't help, I'm in trouble. If you don't show up, I'm in trouble.
I see so often in my own sin. I'll talk to the Lord and I'll say, Lord, if you aren't merciful, if you don't forgive sinners, I have no hope.
But oh thank you that you do. And let me hide in you.
Let me. Let the righteousness of Christ be applied to me.
Let his life and death and burial apply to me.
Let me hide in him.
It's one of my favorite songs is Rock of Ages.
And just at the end it says,
"Let me hide myself in thee, let me hide in you."
And let it be about you.
And so if you've never seen that you actually are not capable enough, strong enough, good enough, if your whole world is about you and you still think you are strong enough, I would say no, come to the Lord.
But if you know you're in debt, in sin, you're destitute, you're distressed, you're bitter, come to the Lord, run to him and say, I need to hide in you.
And for the Christians in the room who are struggling with fear, rehearse for yourself what's true about him.
Start with Psalm 34.
Read it, pray it. Sit. Remind yourself my hope is bound up in you.
That's what Colossians 3 says,
"Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory."
We are hidden with him.
His life and our life, our life is bound up in him.
And with him we are in safe keeping.
Let's pray.
Lord, I pray right now in the name of Jesus, for every person in this room who is self-sufficient. For every person in this room who, when it all boils down, it's just them. Just them and their wisdom, just them and their morality, just them and their strength, just them and their ingenuity, that it's just them.
Lord, I pray that you would, through your Spirit, help them to see how small and how vulnerable and how scary that is, that they might run to you.
Lord, we pray for the person in this room who already sees that, who already feels debt, distress, destitute, desperate, that they would run headlong to you and say, oh, let your life cover me, let your righteousness apply to me. Let me hide myself in you.
And Lord, may the Christians in this room rehearse that over and over and over again. That in fear we might fear you more and know that no one is condemned who takes refuge in you.
In Jesus' name, Amen.
The band's going to come back up. We're going to respond in communion and worship.
1 Samuel 20
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. If you weren't here earlier, I said, my name is Spencer, I'm one of the pastors. We are going to be mostly in First Samuel, chapter 20 as we jump back into First Samuel. We took one break last week, but we're jumping right back in. But we're going to start in actually going back something we've already read back in chapter 18 today. Because what we're going to be seeing in chapter 20 is the friendship of Jonathan and David. But that really begins in 18. And I just wanted the first verse to kind of give us a preview of where we're going.
But in 18:1 it said as soon as he had finished speaking to Saul, this is David.
The soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David. And Jonathan loved him as his own soul.
So this is after David kills Goliath, he sees Jonathan, Jonathan sees him and it says their soul was knit together. And this is the beginning of one of the most famous friendships in all of history. And it begins with two souls knit together in a deep, lasting friendship.
Now as we read this and as we follow the story today, there are parts of us that long for that, that long to have a friendship like this. But where we are kind of culturally, we're not set up well to understand this. I mean, there's lots of warning signs about this. You can look at statistics on this. They've measured kind of friendship and loneliness in America. The bigger problem actually is male friendship and male loneliness. So last year in 2024, they did a study that said that 26% of men reported having six or more close friends. Now back in 1990, that was 55%. So it just kind of shows that over time men are growing lonelier, don't have deep friendships with others like they used to. It's a problem for men and women.
They surveyed all adults. 12% of all adults say they have zero close friends. That 12% of all American adults don't have a friend at all. And we feel the difficulty of that. It gets more complicated, it seems, as you get older to keep friends. That at the end of the movie Stand by Me, a movie from the 80s that captures friendship amongst 12 year old boys, but at the very end he's an adult and he's reflecting back on that summer. And I'll clean up the quote a little bit because it's not appropriate, but he says, I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was 12. Goodness, does anyone.
And it's just capturing, like, yeah, I mean, the type of you remember as a kid how innocent you jumped into friendships? I got a. My youngest, she meets everyone. She's like, I'm gonna be your best friend. Just jumps in immediately. And there's this depth you have that you begin to lose over time. And it begins to get more and more difficult.
One of the jokes that's been thrown around the last few years is that no one talks about the miracle of Jesus having 12 close friends in his 30s. And it's like there's some merit to that where it's just. It's difficult, friendships are difficult. But there's. As culture is seeing this, there's a problem here. There's an epidemic of loneliness, particularly in men. And there's all types of risks associated with this. There's risks to physical health, mental health, to all types of risk of suicide. There's this epidemic of loneliness that hits everyone, that hits men particularly the most.
And a problem for us as we approach this story is that we don't have categories to think about these two men and the closeness that they have culturally. The culture doesn't have a category for this without trying to think that something romantic is going on. And that is because closeness and friendship has even been over sexualized. I mean, years ago there was a very weak attempt to try to fabricate a romantic relationship between David and Jonathan. There's nothing in the text, there has never been anything in these stories to say that over 3,000 years of commentaries on this backs that up. There's nothing here. So that attempt, though weak, isn't around as much anymore. It certainly was agenda driven trying to legitimize homosexuality. But I think it's also symptomatic of a culture, especially amongst men, that cannot conceive of closeness amongst two men. That two men's souls being knit together is literally seen as God gay by our culture. And that's a problem. It's a problem that we can't conceive of nearness like this in men or women, but particularly a problem for men.
So what I'm hoping today is as we walk through this, we're going to view this friendship between David and Jonathan and we're going to see three essential aspects of what it means to be a godly friend. And then my hope is, is that as we learn from David and Jonathan, as we glean from this passage, that we would see where to find the purest form of friendship.
So let me pray and then we'll walk through this together. God, I pray that you give us ears to hear this certainly is not a neutral subject. There are folks here that are struggling in friendships right now. There are folks here that are longing for friendship, feeling lonely. God, I pray that you would speak to us this morning. And we respond as the church is supposed to, by loving you and obeying your word in Jesus name. Amen.
All right, so the verse one said as soon as going back to chapter 18, as soon as he had finished speaking to Saul,
The soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David. And Jonathan loved him as his own soul. And Saul took him that day and would not let him return to his father's house. Then Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as his own soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was on him and gave it to David and his armor and even his sword and his bow and his belt.
Okay, so what we see from here and some examples here, but also the thread that gets pulled throughout this story is the first essential aspect of, of godly friendship. And that is that godly friendship is selfless. The godly friendship is selfless.
We see that Jonathan loves David, and we see later on that David loves Jonathan. It says their souls were knit together, that they kind of make this covenant of friendship. And one of the first things that Jonathan does is a seeing Jonathan seeing David and his soul as more valuable than his. So he loved him like it was his own soul. And then he gives up, says his robe and his armor and his sword and his bow and his belt, that he considers David as more important. He's selfless. He shows a deference here. And that's what godly friendship is. It's caring about your friend more than you do your own self.
But that is not what our culture values in friendship. Our culture doesn't see friendship that way. Our culture sees friendship mostly as back scratching. I scratch your back, but then you got to scratch my back. And if you don't scratch my back, we got a problem. We have an invisible scoreboard for friends in our lives that they have to keep up. They got to do the same. They got to be able to reciprocate. And if they don't, it's a problem. And what happens is when your friend is actually struggling, you're like, what have you done for me? I'm pouring myself out. What are you doing for me?
And there's certainly, listen, there certainly is some wisdom in not burning yourself out on fools. I mean, the Proverbs make that clear. They'll be friends of fools. So there's some wisdom in that. But I think largely what happens is, is that we've made friendship consumeristic. We've watched a lot of Seinfeld, a lot of Friends, a lot of How I Met Your Mother, a lot of shows that make friendship about fun and what they can be given to you and the fun they add to your life. And the moment that your friend is struggling and the moment that your friend is not as fun as they used to be, well, their utility has been used up and then we move on. That's what happens.
But we should look for friends that are selfless. And we should be a friend that is selfless. That's helpful when you go through seasons that are difficult. Last year in particular was not a fun year. This was not a fun year for me, not a fun year for my family. We just had a lot of difficulties and a lot of trials that we were working through. And I was so thankful to Jesus that I had friends that displayed this selflessness, that I had friends that would, at a moment's notice, drop everything and come and watch our children. I had friends that I knew prayed for us regularly. Like they didn't. Just like they didn't say they did, but they actually did it. Actually, I knew that they were regularly praying.
I had friends that would ask questions, difficult questions. I had friends that would embody Proverbs 27:6 that said,
Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but profuse are the kisses of an enemy.
Meaning that good friends are willing to risk relational discomfort in wounding you temporarily for your ultimate good. To have friends that are willing to risk relational capital and make things difficult, to say difficult things to you because it's ultimately for your good, because they care more about you than do the comfort of friendship. We need that.
I was so thankful to God that I had that. And we should seek to be these types of friends like Jonathan, who was selfless.
One of the things that you see throughout this story is that as from this point forward, Jonathan begins to decrease and David begins to increase in favor. Going into chapter 20, you see that Jonathan, who was the son of King Saul, that they start to decrease and Jonathan and David grows in favor with the people. And not for a moment do you see Jonathan respond in selfishness and jealousy and envy of what his friend is getting.
That's wonderful.
One of the things I appreciate about Chet Phillips, which let me give a caveat here, what I'm about to say is something actually really genuine about our friendship. Because I know if you've been here long enough, you know, we poke fun at each other a lot. We burn each other. That's what we do. He preaches, he makes fun of me. I preach, I make fun of him. We're savage towards each other. It's part of our love language.
I'm not going to comment on how he gives awkward hugs. I'm not going to comment on how his face is naturally very angry looking. Looks like the kind of dad that would yell at the refs at a youth football game. I'm not going to say any of that. What I'm about to say is actually quite genuine.
That I appreciate about our friendship is that he is not jealous. There are times where God has blessed me and he's eager to know about it. And he digs. He says, no, no, no, no, tell me more about him. I was like, well, I mean, you know, this happened and that was good. And this happened and that was good. And some folks when you share with, sometimes you're like, you can tell. They're like, oh, I'm so happy for you. It's so good. I'm so glad that God has blessed you. And you're like, okay, I'm gonna reel it back in a little bit.
But with him, he just says, no, tell me more. I want to know. I want to be able to, I want to be joyful when God has blessed you. And that's selflessness. And I appreciate that about the friendship that we have. And that's what Jonathan is to David. As David increases in favor, Jonathan is not envious. He's not clinging to favor of the people, but he's selfless towards David.
Now we're through chapter 19. We saw that Jonathan's father, Saul, King Saul, is trying to kill David over and over again. And then finally we saw at the end of chapter 19 where Saul comes to boldly kill David at the feet of the prophet Samuel. And that God defends David with prophecy, that Saul is stricken with prophecy, prophetic praise. That's how chapter 19 ended.
Years have gone by at this point and Saul is growing in rage towards David. David. And now it's very clear that Saul has it out completely for David. Everybody knows it. And the friendship of Jonathan and David is really being tested in chapter 20 as his rage has been unrelenting. And there's this wonder, did Saul actually, was he changed by God when he was prophesying? Or does he still want David dead? And David thinks, absolutely, he still wants me dead.
So we pick up in verse one of chapter 20, it says,
Then David fled from Naioth at Ramah and came and said before Jonathan, "What have I done? What is my guilt and what is my sin before your father that he seeks my life?" And he said to him, "Far from it! You shall not die. Behold, my father does nothing either great or small without disclosing it to me. And why should my father hide this from me? It is not so." But David vowed again, saying, "Your father knows well that I have found favor in your eyes." And he thought, "Do not let Jonathan know this, lest he be grieved." But truly, as the Lord lives and as your soul lives, there is but a step between me and death."
David's like, your dad wants to kill me. No, really, he wants to kill me. And Jonathan's like, no, no. And then David's like, no, you don't understand. He's trying to. He's still trying to kill me. And Jonathan's like, don't you know that if I find out about this, I'm gonna let you know? And David's like, yeah, but your father knows. He knows of our friendship. He knows of our love for one another. He's gonna hide this from you.
And David, you can tell how distressed he is. And he's like, I'm a step away from death. And then Jonathan hears all this and he says,
Then Jonathan said to David, "Whatever you say, I will do for you."
Okay, whatever you say, I'll do for you. Which again highlights the selflessness of Jonathan. All right, I hear you. I'm listening. What can I do?
Verse 5.
David said to Jonathan, "Behold, tomorrow is the new moon, and I should not fail to sit at the table with the king. But let me go, that I may hide myself in the field to the third day at evening. If your father misses me at all, then say, 'David earnestly asked leave of me to run to Bethlehem, his city, for there is a yearly sacrifice there for all the clan.' If he says, 'Good,' it will be well with your servant. But if he is angry, then know that harm is determined by him."
So David comes up with a plan. They're going to test the wrath of Saul. He says, I'm not going to show up to the new moon festival. This is a time of festivities where they would make sacrifices to the Lord. He was expected to attend as being a part of the king's court. And he says, if I don't show up and your father is okay with it, we'll know that his wrath has subsided and I can come back. But if he's angry and that shows up in my absence I will know that he wants me dead.
Verse 8.
Therefore deal kindly with your servant, for you have brought your servant into a covenant of the Lord with you. But if there is guilt in me, kill me yourself, for why should you bring me to your father?"
And Jonathan said,
Far be it from you! If I knew that it was determined by my father that harm should come to you, would I not tell you?
Then Jonathan said. Then David said to Jonathan, "Who will tell me if your father answers you roughly?" And Jonathan said to David, "Come, let us go out into the field." So they both went out into the field.
So again this back and forth of how am I going to know? How am I going to know that I'm going to be safe? And Jonathan brings them out into the field and they continue this.
In verse 12 it says,
Jonathan said to David, "The Lord, the God of Israel, be witness when I have sounded out my father about this time tomorrow or the third day. Behold, if he is well disposed towards David, shall I not then send and disclose it to you?"
He said, if I find out, I'm going to let you know.
Verse 13.
But should it please my father to do you harm, the Lord do so to Jonathan. More also, if I do not disclose it to you and send you away, that you may go in safety."
He says, if I catch wind that my father wants you dead, I will let you know so that you can safely escape. May the Lord be with you as he has been with my father.
Which Paul's right there. That is the recognition very clearly from Jonathan that the favor of God has shifted from Saul in his house to David. And what he's going to say next is the recognition and the acceptance that David is the anointed king, the one who Samuel anointed to be the next king.
Verse 14.
"If I am still alive, show me the steadfast love of the Lord, that I may not die. And do not cut off your steadfast love from my house forever, when the Lord cuts off every one of the enemies of David from the face of the earth."
And that is a part of this friendship covenant. This agreement is the request: when you become king in your steadfast love towards me, do not take this out on my descendants. My children live as you become king. And Jonathan made a covenant with the house of David, saying,
"May the Lord take vengeance on David's enemies."
And Jonathan made David swear again by his love for him, for he loved him as he loved his own soul.
So they're bound together in this covenant of friendship that will outlive them. And I want us to see the second essential aspect of godly friendship, and that is that godly friendship is steadfast. The godly friendship is steadfast.
Show me the steadfast love of the Lord. Do not cut off your steadfast love from my house forever.
Jonathan asks. Godly friendship is steadfast. You need friends who are steadfast, who are faithful when times are difficult. And you should want to be the type of friend who is steadfast, immovable, faithful to your friend when they are struggling. You should want to embody this type of friendship.
This is what the Proverbs are capturing in Proverbs 18:24, when it says,
A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.
Proverbs 17:17 says,
A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity,
that you want friends and to be the kind of friend who loves at all times, who's born for the difficult moments of life.
So Matt Freeman, who is one of our pastors, and if you've been coming around, if you're new, been around the last couple of months, you haven't seen Matt. He's been on sabbatical for the last three months. This is actually the final week of sabbatical. Be back next week, which is exciting. Yeah, you can celebrate that, ten of you.
But one of the things I've appreciated about the friendship that Matt and I have is that over, really, the close to the last decade of doing ministry together, I know that Matt is going to be steadfast. I know that he's going to be there when things are difficult, when you do ministry together, like, there are things that are wonderful that you get to celebrate of how God is at work in some powerful ways. And there's also a lot of moments of difficulty. And I've just known for years, like, he's there, that he's in it with me, that he's going to stick closer than a brother, that he's going to be steadfast.
I know that when things get difficult, he's going to be there. He's going to. I know that I'm going to get a message from him asking, how are you doing? How's your soul? How's your walk? With Jesus, how's your family? I know he's going to ask. I know he's going to ask difficult questions because he's there with me, side by side. Even when we get in each other's grill sometimes, because every now and then we'll have an argument, we'll have a dust up, because that's what happens when you work together. And there are times when my wife is like, oh, you guys got an argument, and there's tension in her voice and it's like, it's okay, like, we're fine. We're for each other. We're for each other's good. We're going to disagree at times, but I know that he's going to ride or die. I know that we're going to stick it out together because there's this steadfastness, this loyalty, this faithfulness within him.
And that's the type of faithfulness and steadfastness that Jonathan and David display towards each other. That in the face of death, in the face of some really big political changes that are happening, they are knit together, their love and their friendship is. Is steadfast, it is going to make it and traverse through any of the storms they're about to face.
And that is the type of friendship that we should seek and the type of friends we should seek to be. There's a steadfastness in their friendship.
It continues in verse 18 as they're working out this plan.
Then Jonathan said to him, "Tomorrow is the new moon, and you will be missed because your seat will be empty on the third day. Go down quickly to the place where you hid yourself when the matter was in hand, and remain beside the stone heap. And I will shoot three arrows to the side of it as though I shot at a mark. And behold, I will send the boy, saying, 'Go find the arrows.' If I say to the boy, 'Look, the arrows are on this side of you, take them,' then you are to come, for as the Lord lives, it is safe for you and there is no danger. But if I say to the youth, 'Look, the arrows are beyond you,' then go, for the Lord has sent you away. And as for the matter of which you and I have spoken, behold, the Lord is between you and me forever."
So they devise this plan because it seems like they can't even be seen together at this point that they're going to have. He's going to go out, he's going to shoot arrows, and he says, I shoot him. And they land on this side. And I say to my arrow boy, go to this side and if you get the arrows, you'll know that's the signal. It's safe to come out, it's safe to come back.
Saul doesn't want to kill you. But if I shoot beyond and I tell my arrow boy that the arrows are beyond, you should know that you need to run because my father wants to kill you. So that's the secret sign that they work out together.
All right? Verse 24.
So David hid himself in the field. And when the new moon came, the king sat down to eat food. The king sat on his seat, as at other times on the seat by the wall. Jonathan sat opposite and Abner sat by Saul's side. But David's place was empty.
Verse 26.
Yet Saul did not say anything that day, for he thought something has happened to him. He is not clean, surely he is not clean.
He just thinks, okay, he might be ceremonially unclean. So if you're ceremonially unclean, you can't be in the presence of others. You gotta do some rituals, come back. He'll be back the next day.
Verse 27.
But on the second day, the day after the new moon, David's place was empty. And Saul said to Jonathan, his son, "Why has not the son of Jesse come to the meal either yesterday or today?"
Jonathan answered Saul,
"David earnestly asked leave of me to go to Bethlehem. He said, 'Let me go, for our clan holds a sacrifice in the city, and my brother has commanded me to be there.' So now if I found favor in your eyes, let me get away and see my brothers.' For this reason, he has not come to the king's table."
So I'm going to sugarcoat that straight up lie. Bible's not prescriptive and sometimes like this very descriptive of what's happening here. So he lies. Saul doesn't buy it at all.
Verse 30.
Then Saul's anger was kindled against Jonathan. And he said to him, "You son of a perverse rebellious woman!"
Which that's his wife taking shots everywhere.
"You son of a perverse, rebellious woman, do I not know that you have chosen the son of Jesse to your own shame and the shame of your mother's nakedness? For as long as the son of Jesse lives on earth, neither you nor your kingdom shall be established."
Which what he does there is he appeals to the base desire of power. Don't you know that David sits on the throne that you're supposed to sit on next? That he's taking the throne from you to your own shame? Jonathan, will you not turn him over? Turn him in so that you can be the future king.
He appeals to this base desire for power.
For as long as the Son of Jesse lives on earth, neither you nor your kingdom shall be established. Therefore send and bring him to me, for he shall surely die."
And Jonathan answered Saul, his father,
"Why should he be put to death? What has he done?"
But Saul hurled his spear at him to strike him.
So Jonathan knew that his father was determined to put David to death.
And Jonathan rose from the table in fierce anger and ate no food the second day of the month. For he was grieved for David because his father had disgraced him.
So Jonathan seeks to again make the case he's done nothing to you. He's only done good to you.
In this country does what Saul does repeatedly, which is pick up. I don't know if he has these spears handy all the time. I mean, he just must rule with a spear. But he also, he's not good at it because he misses again. Happens multiple times in the story. He keeps missing.
And Jonathan is grieved. He's grieved because he knows that his father seeks to kill him. And this is going to change things going forward.
Verse 35.
In the morning, Jonathan went out to the field to the appointment with David and with him, a little boy. They're going to enact a plan, he said to his boy, "Run and find the arrows that I shoot." As the boy ran, he shot an arrow beyond him. And when the boy came to the place of the arrow that Jonathan had shot, Jonathan called after the boy and said, "It's not the arrow beyond you," it's the signal." And Jonathan called after the boy, "Hurry, be quick and do not stay."
So Jonathan's boy gathered up the arrows and came to his master. But the boy knew nothing. Only Jonathan and David knew the matter.
And Jonathan gave his weapons to his boy and said to him,
"Go and carry them in."
Carry them to the city so that signals you need to run. My father wants to kill you.
Verse 41.
As soon as the boy had gone, David rose from beside the stone heap and fell on his face to the ground and bowed three times. And they kissed one another and wept with one another, David weeping the most.
Then Jonathan said to David,
"Go in peace, because we have sworn both of us in the name of the Lord, saying, 'The Lord shall be between me and you and between my offspring and your offspring.'"
For
And they rose and departed, and Jonathan went into the city.
So when the arrow boy is there, their emotions are held together and they begin to be released.
Now you might be thinking, as I thought, why did you go to all this trouble to do this sign if you're just going to pop out and talk? As I had the same thought, I don't fully know my best, my best take is that that was the plan. But they're so overwhelmed by emotion and they're so overwhelmed by their love for one another that this can't be the last time they see each other, that they're willing to risk safety for the sake of embracing one last time as friends.
So he comes out, bows to the ground, showing deference and respect. They kiss, which this is like Italians do today. This is a cultural greeting for them. So this is kissing on both sides of the cheek. New Testament says, greet each other with a holy kiss.
You've been here long enough, you know, we don't do that. We're not going to start. But this is dapping each other up. This is bro huggin. This is the culturally appropriate way to greet one, to greet a friend like this. So they greet, they embrace, and they weep.
This is David. So David wept the most, weeping bitterly. And I think the reason, A, why they're willing to risk coming out in the open and B, why this is such a grievous moment, such a sad filled moment is because they know everything's going to change. Their friendship and the way that it has gone is not going to continue. David's going to be on the run for the rest of his days. They won't be together anymore and their hearts are broken because of the love they have for one another as friends and what they're having to give up to continue.
And that brings me to the third essential aspect of godly friendship. And that godly friendship is sacrificial. The godly friendship is sacrificial.
It's hard to tell when Jonathan knew fully that David was the one that Samuel had anointed to be the future king of Israel. Some are going to argue and say that in the beginning of chapter 18, when he gives up his cloak, he gives up his, his robe and his armor that's symbolic of the passing of the torch and that Jonathan in that moment was conveying that. I think that's a little speculative, but I wouldn't lean and say that's put a ton of force on that. It certainly shows a great amount of deference and respect.
But boy, oh boy, when you get through chapter 19, if you're not convinced by the end of chapter 19, it's so clear here in chapter 20 that Jonathan knows that God has chosen David to be king and not him. He knows it.
Which means that every single step that Jonathan takes in helping David is solidifying David on the throne and not him. That every time, that he continues to help David, every time he helps save and preserve his life, that he is counting the future of David as more significant than his own. That he's sacrificing his place on the throne.
He's not fighting the will of God. He's trusting in God's will and his choice. And also loving his friend sacrificially. It's a beautiful picture. What friendship is supposed to be in sacrificial friendship.
One of the themes that shows up in the Lord of the Rings and the series is friendship. One of the main themes of that story. And particularly if you focus on the friendship between Samwise and Frodo, the two hobbits, that is one filled with sacrificial friendship.
In the first movie, when Frodo has decided that he's going to go on his own, he's going to take the Ring himself, that he gets on the boat and Sam, who cannot swim, follows him out into the water and begins to drown himself because he's so committed for the betterment of Frodo to help his friend that he's willing to sacrifice his own life to make the point.
The books quote and say, "I'll knock holes in all the boats." That's this thing. You're not going without me. I'm giving up my life, my safety, for the sake of helping you and the burden that you are carrying. I'll sink every boat and we'll sink together. But you're not going out alone.
And when you follow that story throughout all three of the movies or books, you see this over and over and over again, all the way to the very end where they're almost there to deliver the Ring and they're starving and they only got a little food left. And Sam gives Frodo the majority of the food, sacrificing for the sake of his friend who's so deeply burdened. It's a beautiful picture of sacrificial friendship.
Are you willing to be the type of friend that says, I will sink this boat? You're not going anywhere until we talk this through, until you tell me what's going on, until you let me help you. Are you willing to be the type of friend who's willing to go without that your friend is struggling and they're in their season of adversity. And when you talk, they're mostly sharing about their problems. But you're willing to sacrifice sharing your life for the sake of helping them bear this burden. Because you love them and because you count them more significant than yourself. Are you willing to be a sacrificial friend on behalf of your friends?
That's what Jonathan was to David. It's a beautiful picture of sacrificial friendship. To love your friend at cost to yourself. Your friendship was filled with selfless, steadfast and sacrificial friendship.
Now as you walk through this, you may be receiving this and may be thinking and evaluating. Man, I wish I had friends like that. You may be thinking about the friends in your life. I wish that person was more selfless. That person, they're not steadfast, they're not faithful like they should be. They're not sacrificing.
And what I want to push on is I think you've missed a step. Because if you're immediate response to this story is to begin to evaluate all the ways that your friends have failed you, you haven't looked in the mirror first.
Jesus says,
"Take the plank out of your own eye, so that you can see the speck in your brother's eye."
You should do the soul work of examining your own heart and asking difficult questions.
Have I been selfless? Like, really considering others more significant than myself? Are you steadfast? Are you there when things are difficult? Are you looking for an exit as soon as things get difficult, as soon as the fun stops? Do you sacrifice? Do you give up time? Do you give up energy? Are you willing to give away for the sake of your friend and your friends?
And maybe you do that soul work and you say, yeah, I need to repent here. I need to change here. I need to have a conversation there. And then you come to the conclusion, but, yeah, but there's still this longing within me. Like, I've tried to be a friend for years and this type of deep friendship has eluded me for years. And this becomes really a story of pain for you.
What I'd like to suggest is two things.
The first, don't give up. I think the Church of Jesus Christ is a beautiful place to find friends, to find deep friendships that embody the friendship of David and Jonathan.
So first is, don't give up. Press in.
The second is that it's very possible that you have placed your hope in the friendship of men and women. And what I want to very clearly say is that your ultimate hope should be in friendship with God. That this deep longing and desire will only be fully satiated and satisfied in friendship with God.
Because while Jonathan and David are a wonderful example of friendship, and they are, and we should learn from them, they are not the purest form of friendship that is found in this life.
You see, Jonathan and David start as two men who love each other. But the friendship that God offers doesn't start that way. The friendship that Jesus offers us is to people who are hostile to him, to people who oppose his very ways.
You see, when you read the Gospels and you get to a passage like Luke 7, when chapter 7, verse 34, when the Pharisees, the religious leaders are taking a shot at Jesus and they say,
"The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, 'Look at him, a glutton, a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.'"
That when we read that, we most often think about the self righteousness of the religious leaders because Jesus is willing to be friends with the lowliest, the sinners.
But what gets lost in them is that Jesus befriends crowds of people whose very lives and the choices that they make every day oppose the way that Jesus has set out for creation, that they, with every deliberate choice to sin against God, they have chosen to sin against Jesus.
And what this ultimately is, is foreshadowing of what Jesus offers us in the Gospel that we, as the passage we read earlier, were alienated and hostile in mind. What Mike was preaching about last week, that as Jesus displays kindness to us, we don't start that way. We are enemies of God.
So this isn't two people who love each other initially. This is Jesus who loves hostile sinners. And the love and the friendship that he offers us breaks through to our hearts in a way that captures us.
And another foreshadowing that Jesus does in his ministry. In John 15, Jesus says,
"Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends."
Which is a foreshadowing of what's about to happen in an act so selfless, so steadfast in love, so sacrificial, that Jesus lays down his life at the cross for enemies to make them friends.
That is the purest form of friendship that you can discover in this life. It is friendship with God and fellowship with him that you get a picture of now that resounds more beautifully, more wonderfully into eternity.
That is where our hope should be.
So yes, as we learn this and as we talk about this in groups this week, we absolutely should learn from David and Jonathan and we should see the selflessness and the steadfastness and the sacrificial nature of their friendship. And we should walk away from this, evaluating ourselves, the friends that we can be.
But for those of us that are longing for fellowship, those of us that are longing for friendship, we must first take the step of finding that in Christ and the most perfect and most pure friendship that is offered in him.
The band's going to come up and we get to do that and consider that for a moment, that we should consider Christ and what he offers.
And it is possible that for some of you, the loneliness that you feel in this life is not just because you don't have good friends. It's because you actually don't have Christ.
And my hope for you this morning is that you would find your hope for fulfillment and friendship in Christ and Him alone.
And for those of us who have trusted in Jesus, some of us need to walk away and we need to. We might need to have some conversations with some people this week, might need to confess some sin and confess some ways that we have failed, might need to consider the ways in which we need to grow in this so that we can be the type of godly friend that desires that God desires his people be.
Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us see the friendship that is offered in you, the friendship that is offered in our Savior, in Christ, the friend that we have in him. God, I pray that that would compel our hearts towards faith and surrendering to have fellowship with you from here into eternity. God, I pray that we would not leave this word without reflecting on our own hearts and the ways that we have failed to be the friends that God has called us to be and that we would change. And that the fruit that comes out of the effort this week results in reconciliation. It results in love, results in service, results in godliness and friendship. We ask this in Jesus name, Amen.
Luke 6:27-36
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Mike and I was going to walk out the back door, but Isaac had to mention my name in the prayer, so I decided to go ahead and come on up here today. I am not one of the pastors here, but I am an elder in training. Over the last several years in my life, I've been exercising the calling of God that I feel on my life and in my heart toward pastoral ministry. It's something that I have felt growing for a long time. A few months ago, I was asked to participate in the elder training process. I am working this calling out. I'm not just a pastor when I want to be. I am working this calling out with my friends, with my community group, and under the guidance of our elders here. They've given me this opportunity this morning.
I have a day job. I am a physician kind of by training, and that's what I do Monday through Friday throughout the week. Over the last several years, I have had the opportunity to teach in different settings here in our church. I've been able to teach some of your children in the kids city setting. We actually do an assembly similar to this, and we do 60 to 70 minutes of teaching and they don't complain. So no, we do just a couple short minutes of teaching with them and then we break out into classrooms and teach, and I've gotten to share the Scriptures with them there.
I had the opportunity to share the Scriptures with some of your teenagers in the student night setting. Just this last semester, I was able to teach alongside Isaac Hill, who heads that up, and we were working through the Gospel of John. We were blessed by that, and we were thankful to be able to share that with the teenagers in that setting.
I've also been able to teach some of you next door in the Sunday school setting just last week. I was able to do that. Our brother Scott Hill faithfully teaches that class week after week after week. That meets in our other building at 9:30. It's an excellent opportunity to study the word together, and he's let me teach alongside him and he's given me the opportunity to fill in for him when he steps away.
I was asked or I was given the option to pick the text that I wanted to, and I decided to pick something from the New Testament. We've been going through Samuel, right? We've been going through Old Testament narrative, and I was thinking, well, maybe let's step away from that and let's go into the New Testament for a little bit and spend a week here. I thought, what specifically would our congregation want to hear? And I thought, well, maybe something with a lot of imagery, a lot of pictures, a lot of symbolism, something that's got parts of it that are hotly contested and debated. And so, of course, I landed on Revelation. But I decided maybe something a little bit different would be more appropriate for our setting.
Today, we are going to be in the Gospel of Luke. We're going to be in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 6, verses 27-36. Before we start, I'm going to pray and ask for the Lord's help.
Father, we thank you for the opportunity to study the Scripture this morning. We've really got nothing apart from it. It tells us of you, and it's our privilege to be able to know it, to study it, and to have our lives changed from it. You know that I am a man desperately in need of grace, and I pray that you would meet me with your grace this morning in Jesus' name. Amen.
So let's open up our Bibles to Luke chapter 6, verses 27-36. This is on page 53 in the blue Bible. The blue Bibles are under the seats in the rows in front of you and you can grab those, and if you don't have a Bible you can actually keep that. We want you to have a copy of God's word.
Like I said, we are stepping out today from the Old Testament narrative in Samuel, narrative of David, of Saul, of the Israelite people, of Samuel himself at that time, and now we're kind of jumping into the New Testament narrative in the Gospel of Luke. This is the story of Jesus Christ.
Just briefly for some context, Luke wrote this gospel around 58 to 60 AD. It is a defense of the Christian faith. It tells the story of the Christ on earth and it shows us Jesus's mission which was to bring salvation to people as well as fulfill some of the Old Testament prophecies that were written about him. Luke himself was a physician, so we can infer he was smart. He was probably pretty cool. I'll leave it there. He was a companion to the Apostle Paul, and Luke spent years interviewing eyewitnesses, people who walked alongside Jesus. And he compiled all of that into this gospel account.
What we're going to look at today, this section does mirror another section in a different gospel. And that's common for that to happen. But it mirrors some similar teaching more familiar you might have heard called the Sermon on the Mount which is Matthew 5 through 7. This passage in Luke has some similarities to it.
So what we're going to study or what we're going to look at is what Jesus has to teach his followers about kindness and compassion. We're going to begin in verse 27.
“But I say to you who hear,
Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,
bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.
To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also,
and from one who takes away your cloak do not withhold your tunic either.
Give to everyone who begs from you,
and from one who takes away your goods do not demand them back.
And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.”
Now, we probably hear all that and think, "Yeah, oh yeah, absolutely. That sounds good. That sounds fine." Especially when we hear that last verse, right? Because we can latch on to that because we've heard it before. That's one of those phrases that sort of has permeated and passed through our culture through generations. And it's something known as the golden rule.
Parents teach an aspect of this to their kids, right? When you hit your brother or when you're deciding, should I hit my brother? I want you to think, do you want your brother to hit you? And even at a young age, you can conceptualize that pretty well. I don't want to get hit. I'm not going to hit my brother.
Teachers in a classroom setting, right? As kids are going from, especially in younger ages, as they're going from being just at home to now interacting with people from other families, teaching them how to interact with those people, how they would want to be interacted with. And there's even probably some level in our workplaces that we apply this teaching, right? If you are wondering, should I put that in the email to everyone? Should I put that thing about my coworker in there? Maybe think, would you like to read that about you? Right? If you do that, that's probably a fairly safe way to navigate those different interactions.
So, we've heard this many times and we usually just agree. When was the last time you saw on CNN, golden rule is being revoked? We're anti-Golden rule, and the golden rule is canceled. Right? You don't see that happening. I actually did this week and Googled, is the golden rule outdated or something to see? I did find an article, but it was on a website I hadn't heard of, so I didn't click on it. I decided that that was probably not something that was being spread through the masses at large, so this would actually still make sense.
But if we are really going to understand what Jesus is calling us to do and really understand the weight of these statements, we have to go back and think about who he's commanding us to act this way towards. He says,
“Those who hate you, those who curse you, those who abuse you,
those who strike you, and those who take from you.”
Guys, this is not a call to be nice to your friends. This is not a call to be kind to the person that you sit next to on Sundays at church. This is a call to be kind to the people who absolutely cannot stand you.
Now, we have a tendency probably in our minds to think or to wonder, is Jesus overselling this, right? Is he going really far in how he's talking to us? But if you do half of that, it's probably fine. We have a tendency to think maybe this is just for effect. But to help us understand that, let's think about who he was talking to, who was standing in the crowd. That was a mix of Jewish people probably from Jerusalem and from Judea.
These are the people whose ancestors we read about when we studied the book of Exodus. These are the people who were enslaved by the Egyptian Pharaoh who never had a day off to rest from work, who made bricks to build up that kingdom, never seeing an ounce of the glory, an ounce of the honor for their own. Even when they were about to escape from Egypt, the Pharaoh in his final act sent his army out to die, trying to retrieve them and bring them back under oppression.
After that, they wandered through the wilderness for many years and they went through this cycle of oppression with other nations and judges, and God raised up judges for them. They turned from what God had said to them to do and they went back to their sin, and they're in this constant cycle of oppression.
And then right up to where we're studying on Sundays, these kingdoms said, "We want a king. We want a king." And they were given one. God relented, they were given a king. Ultimately that kingdom is fractured, and nothing comes of it, and they end up being dissipated and occupied by other nations, right? The Babylonians, the Persians—throughout history, these really prominent, massive empires occupied and oppressed this people group.
And now when Jesus is talking to them, they're under occupation still. They're under occupation from the Roman Empire. So he said all these things to a people that were hated, that were cursed, that were abused, that were struck, and that had every single thing taken from them. Jesus is not overstating or overselling this at all. This would have actually directly applied to the people that he was talking to that day. It would have probably been felt very deeply and viscerally by them. And this thing He was calling them to do would have seemed truly impossible.
Now, this teaching calls them into kindness, right? But what does it have to do with us? Two days ago, we celebrated a holiday that exists to show that we are not under another empire, that we are not subject to another regime. One of our pastors spent time giving missiles to people to shoot into the air just so they could show that a British soldier could not come into their house without a warrant and take their stuff and make them cook for them.
So we are not exactly under, in our current day and age, the oppression of another outside regime. Why this teaching still brings to bear on our lives is because things like hate, abuse, and stealing have been permeating cultures throughout all of time and they absolutely exist in our culture today. Even if you personally haven't experienced something like that or something that extreme, the point Jesus is getting at is not to minimize what you've walked through in your life actually, but to emphasize just how great the thing that he's calling us into is.
So I want us to go back through that text again and think about each one of these directives. Love your enemies. Love is sometimes a wishy-washy word or a phrase that our culture doesn't always know what it exactly means. But we do have some biblical data that tells us patience, kindness, not envying, not boasting, not making yourself out better than someone else. We have some terms for love that we can use.
Most commonly in our culture and in the Bible, we think about love in the sense of husbands and wives, spouses. That's a fairly easy example for us to grasp what love probably looks like. So here Jesus says,
"Love your enemies."
And tags it right up next to doing this. Or he says to love and tags this right up next to doing this to your enemies.
This is not like I'm driving down the road and somebody cuts me off in traffic and I say, "You know, I see him later," and I just wave them along. I'm going to be the bigger person. This is saying somebody's flying down the road and sideswipes me and I drive off the road and I hit a tree and I'm severely injured and my car is totally destroyed and I'm in the hospital for months and when I finally recover, I've got nothing left in my name. I barely have a car to drive. I'm going down the road and I see that same guy and his lane's ending and he's in trouble if he doesn't get over and I let him in. That's loving your enemies.
Doing good to those who hate you means improving the well-being of the person that actively hates you. When people hate us, we probably do one of two things. We either hate them back. "You're going to get into me. I'm going to get after you," like we're buttheads and have fights over things like that, or we just say, "No, you're not going to bother me. You're going to take the high ground and not say anything." And even we see this play out in kids in middle school and high school. There are either fistfights or people pretend like they don't hear what you say because that way it looks like it didn't bother me, and then at home they deal with the fallout of that.
But what doing good to those who hate you is, is when your neighbor comes to you and says, "I'm building a fence on my property and it's going to go five feet into your property line and I don't really care." No matter what you say to him, he's going to do that. One day you come home and it's not five feet on your lawn, it's 10 feet on your lawn. And if you live in a subdivision, that's a lot. So you are seriously out some space. And then when he comes home from work the following day, you're in his front yard. You've cut it perfectly. You're edging right along the driveway. You've got the leaf blower, and you're cleaning it off and you're making it look perfect.
That's actually improving the well-being of a person who hates you.
Bless those who curse you. Now, we don't have a great frame of reference for this currently. Blessing and cursing. I would wager that most of you who said bless this week meant it in the context of a sneeze. But that is not really what blessing is here. Blessing is I am praying for God's favor to be put on another person.
One of the famous examples we have comes from the Old Testament book of Numbers. God says to Moses,
"Go pronounce this blessing on your brother."
And it's
"The Lord bless you and keep you;
the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you;
the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace."
That's an actual blessing—wanting blessing for another person.
Cursing is also not the way we use it today or cussing. It's a little bit different than what we use today. Cursing is not foul language, rude gestures, inappropriate conversation, as we have it in our context. Cursing is more like the opposite of blessing in that I want your total ruin and total destruction to be brought down on somebody. We do have some Bible examples of cursing. Even just when sin entered in the world, God cursed the earth. And so you can look at different times in the Bible where we see cursing. But blessing and cursing are paired together.
So this is saying that while you are actively praying and asking God, "Will you give him 10 children who each have 10 children? Will you give him everyone in his family who is healthy? Would you make him live to be a hundred and fifteen, and pass away sweetly with his family surrounded by him? All his businesses, tens upon tens upon tens would have success and he would be rich and all the world's goods."
While you're asking that for a person, that same person is hoping that you're totally and completely destroyed off of the earth. While you're hoping for his peaceful end with him surrounded by his family, he's hoping your bloodline comes to an end, that you never find a partner, that you never have a child, and that your last name is totally and utterly destroyed.
That is blessing the people that curse you.
Pray for those who abuse you. This one is probably a little challenging for us to hear. The word abuse sits pretty heavy on our shoulders and even when we hear it, we recoil. Some of you have actually experienced real abuse in awful, awful ways.
Jesus here says,
"On your knees, intercede before the Father on behalf of the person who inflicted you this pain. Pray for those who abuse you."
To the one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also. Just sort of by way of explanation, this is not a little essay on pacifism. Should we fight in wars? Should I defend myself in my house? Striking someone on the cheek is really meant to symbolize or show disrespect. That's what it meant in this cultural context.
And I think we probably have that translate to our cultural moment today. I don't know if I was at an award show—the Tonys, the Grammys, maybe the Oscars—and somebody got up and said something disrespectful about my wife's hair, I might get up and slap that person, and that would be a sign of disrespect given back to them. And I think everybody would be able to do that. And of course, I would go on to win best actor.
This is when the guy at work puts you down, mocks you in front of everyone, and then later the boss comes to you and says, "Hey, you know, so and so, he's actually up for a promotion. What do you think?" And this is you saying, "You know, I think he's pretty good at his time management skills. I think he's got good computer skills," and you start highlighting different things about him that he doesn't deserve to have highlighted about him, but you start highlighting these positive things. Instead of returning disrespect with disrespect, you give respect to him and speak honorably about him.
And from the one who takes your cloak, do not withhold your tunic either. Give to everyone who begs from you. And from one who takes away your goods, do not demand them back.
So a cloak is like an outer covering like a jacket. A tunic is more underneath. It covers you from the shoulders down to the hips or ankles depending on how homeschooled you were. So this is saying be radically generous to the people who steal from you.
So, you're at the beach, you're on vacation, and you're walking down the street, and somebody picks your pocket and takes off, and you take off after them and you call the police and you got this guy. You caught him and the police look at you and say, "Well, he stole from you. Do you want to press charges?" And you say, "No." In fact, I had $100 in my wallet, but I'm going to write you a check. I'm going to write you a check for $200. Because this is what it means that when somebody takes your cloak not to withhold your tunic from them.
Also,
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
This really does summarize all of these directives well, guys. Sometimes we have such a strong desire for justice and it really, really irks us to see these perpetrators get away with things. But I do want to remind you that in the book of Hebrews, we're told,
"There is no creature hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account."
God will make these things right. People who commit injustices will be held accountable.
What he has not done is asked us in this text to mediate out and give out that justice. He teaches us to love. He teaches us to do good and he teaches us to give not just to the people that like us. Not even just to the people that are kind of indifferent to us or tolerate us, but to the people who absolutely cannot stand us and actively choose to oppose us.
Next here in the passage, he's going to talk to us about how the world accomplishes this. We're going to pick up in verse 32.
"If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them.
And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.
And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners and get back the same amount."
I think Jesus chooses to give us this explanation here because we sort of gravitate towards this, right? We want to be nice to the people that like us really. Well, if your friend calls you on the phone and they've had a rough day and they're going on and on and you're listening and being empathetic and encouraging them, at the end of the call, they say, "Wow, thank you. You were so kind. Thank you for listening." You might think, "Yeah, you know, I guess in just in the friend group, I'm the kind friend. Yeah, that makes sense."
Or if your co-worker, who you actually do get along with, who helps you out, gets a busy project thrown at them and they're going to be there late and you say, "You know what? I'm going to pitch in and help them take some of that workload off them." And then a few weeks later, you hear them talking and they're saying, "Yeah, you know, he pitched in and helped me right when I needed to. He sacrifices himself. He's so kind." You might think, "Yeah, I am the dependable co-worker. I am kind. I do that. Yeah."
Or if your friend forgets their wallet when you go out to lunch and you spot him and then you think, "Well, now I've got insurance if I ever forget my wallet and I'm out with him." Or if he asks, "Can I—he's going to buy pizza." I don't have to chip in because I already kicked in and gave it to them. We encounter these kind of circumstances all the time.
And this is probably how we think without realizing. We trick ourselves into thinking that we are more kind than we really are. And the reason is because the people we like to be kind to are the people that like us. And so Jesus here very directly is saying that if you're kind to people so that you can just be praised and rewarded, then you are no different than the people who don't follow Christ or don't know Christ because even they are capable of that.
Jesus calls us into sacrificial kindness and sacrificial giving. He calls us to do this to our enemies. And he rebukes the kindness that results in our own advancement in our own gain.
In World War II, on December 20th of 1943, a German pilot by the name of Franz Stigler was flying in German airspace and he encountered a very badly damaged bomber flown by an American pilot with an American crew. He could see holes from multiple bullets in this plane and he could see the crew looked weak and near the point of death. And he had a moment where he could have gone different ways. He could have shot that plane as an enemy out of the sky, reported it back, and been awarded for what he had done. But that's not what he did.
He flew up alongside the wing of this badly damaged American plane and escorted it out of German airspace because he knew that a German anti-aircraft gun would not shoot up at a German plane. He escorted them out to safety and they landed in Switzerland. After that moment finished, the two pilots got out and saluted each other and then the German pilot flew back into Germany. This was never publicized because at the time telling people that an enemy showed kindness isn't good for the war effort.
We don't want to think that our enemy is capable of that, right? But interestingly, in the early 2000s, years after, they were actually able to meet and they became friends and they remained friends until they both passed away just a few months apart from each other in the same year. I think this is just in a small way an example of what it means to look like to be kind or to be compassionate to your enemies.
Now go back with me if you will to the crowd. The crowd that stands there before Jesus. Imagine being one of those people who has been taught since birth from grandma, grandpa, mom, dad, all the cycles of oppression that have kept that people down. And even as they walk out of town to hear Jesus talk, they pass by Roman soldiers who are an ever-present reminder to them of the inescapable enemy that always lurks where they are.
And Jesus says,
"Love those people."
Some of the people that followed Jesus were even part of zealous religious groups who wanted to commit political violence and wanted to commit assassinations. And they're standing there listening to Jesus.
"Love your enemies."
Even you guys put yourself in that position, right? Imagine standing there and think to yourself, Jesus just said,
"Love the guy who put me down so he could get a promotion.
Love the girl that used to bully me in school.
Love the person that inflicted the most emotional pain and suffering or even physical suffering that I've ever experienced."
What would you be thinking? You would be thinking what they were thinking.
Why? Why on earth would we ever do it? They're awful. They are horrible. Why would I ever love them? And if I wanted to, how could it be possible that I could be capable of that?
And as the tension rises in their minds and as the tension rises in our own minds and these questions develop, Jesus tells us the answer:
"But love your enemies and do good and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.
Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful."
Jesus says that in order to be kind to our enemies, we must understand that God himself was kind to us. See, the answer we come up with is, "Oh, when they apologize to me, then I'll be kind." When they start changing their actions and I actually see it, then I'll be kind. But Jesus says,
"No, kindness to your enemies can only be achieved one way, and it's by understanding God's kindness to you."
Follow this with me. Jesus here teaches,
"Be kind to your enemies."
He roots that kindness in God's kindness to us. Why does that actually make sense? Romans 8:7-8:
"For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot.
Those who are in the flesh cannot please God."
It makes sense because before we knew Jesus Christ, we were God's enemies. And you might not think that's possible or you might think, "No, that's too much." Well, God, the infinite, existing before anything else for all time, spoke a world into existence, put people on that world to worship him. And I'm not even talking about going through the Ten Commandments and you lied. I'm sure you did. No, no, no, no. I'm talking this God is worthy of our worship at all times. And every time we sit and enjoy our house and we enjoy our family and we enjoy our truck and whatever, and we don't roll it up into worship of the almighty God, we have sinned and we are God's enemy.
Is it that serious? Absolutely. It's that serious. The only way that we can be kind is to understand that God forgave his enemies. And the people that were standing there that day, they've got no idea what's about to come. That he would go through a total sham of a trial and be convicted of a crime that he did not commit.
That he would be physically tortured, beaten, assaulted, that he would be given a purple robe and a crown of thorns, total mockery, so that he might feel shame. And they would make him pick up the cross and walk up the hill, put it up, and they nail him to it and hang him up there in front of everyone to see to execute him.
And while he's up there, we have his words recorded for us:
"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."
The beauty of the gospel is that Jesus Christ died for his enemies.
Romans 5:9-11, we read it this morning:
"Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.
For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.
But more than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation."
The story of the Bible is the story of God's kindness to us. So if you today don't know Christ in that way, that's the type of kindness I'm inviting you into. If you do know Jesus, he really does want you to be kind like this. Let's take time to ask the Spirit to reveal the areas where we overlook this teaching.
So, who hates you? Who have you hated? Who curses you? Who have you wanted to see destroyed? Who has abused you? Who has disrespected you? Who has taken from you your time, your money, whatever it is? Is it really important that we be kind to these people? Yes.
Romans 2:4-5:
"Do you despise the riches of his kindness, forbearance, and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?"
Kindness is crucial, but we need the help of the Spirit in order to do this. We cannot do it on our own. In our sin, we try to be kind and sometimes it doesn't work. And sometimes we try to be kind and we actually end up being rude and it goes the total opposite direction.
This is not how we naturally think about being kind. We think, well, it's genetic. Have you met that family? They're all smiling. That's not my family. We're sarcastic. We don't do that. We think someone is kind because they don't have the stress we do. If you had my job, you'd understand. I'm way too stressed out to just be kind to everybody I meet. I use it all up at work.
We think we don't have to be kind. Look at my kids. I spend all my time raising those kids, teaching those kids, and trying to be kind to those kids. I don't have leftover to give to the people outside of that. We think when things get better, then I'll be kind. My retirement account's in good shape. My bank account's in good shape. When my house is the house I want, everything's fixed up. When I'm good, then I'll be kind to other people.
This text would suggest otherwise.
We're going to have the band go ahead and come back up here as we close. I think that when Jesus says in verse 36,
"Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful,"
that actually sums all of this up really well.
What is mercy? Mercy is having compassion and kindness on someone whom it is within your power to punish. Our prayer today should be that God would help us to know in our minds and feel in our hearts the depths of the mercy he poured out on us in Christ so that we may reflect that mercy to the world around us.
Some of you need to consider that you are an enemy of Christ but that he died for you and he is welcoming you into his kindness. Some of you have basked in his kindness for years and not for a second thought about how you might reflect that kindness to other people.
If God would go so far as to die on the cross, then you can pray a blessing on a person that's cursed you. You can be kind to the people that make your heart race when we say words like enemy and abuser. The world can't do this. They can be kind to who's kind to them. Only the people of Christ can be kind to their enemies.
By God's grace, may we be a people who understand the mercy of God in our lives. And may this translate into us being merciful and kind to the world around us.
1 Samuel 18-19
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
We're continuing to walk through the book of 1 and 2 Samuel or first 2 Samuel. We're in 1 Samuel chapter 18 and 19 today. So we have two chapters to work through. So you can go ahead and turn there. It should be on page 138 in the blue Bibles.
You can follow along. The text will be on the screen as well. So in American western culture, one of the things that uh that is prevalent in our mainstream thought is that each of us have this worldview that we're at the center of our own lives. That we're like kings and queens of our own lives. In fact, some people use the language of I'm a king.
I'm a queen. Just we have this idea of just I'm the center. and it shows up all over the place in how we view the world. One of the ways that I've realized this, how it's infiltrated my soul, uh, is on the roadways. So, when I'm driving, uh, if I got to get to point A to point B, it's I it's this is my road.
I'm driving like I everyone else needs to clear a path because don't they know I'm supposed to be getting where I'm going and the moment that you cut me off at any given time, it's a problem. Doesn't help that I'm seated in a car which feels like a race car even though it's a Prius humming down the road as fast as I can go barreling getting everyone out of my way. And I've tried to make this shift and I think I'm getting some progress in this in my own soul of realizing and making a shift that says actually this isn't all about me. This I share the road with others. everyone's trying to get somewhere and having the mindset of being a little more gracious, letting people in, not taking it so personally when somebody cuts me off.
Like I'm growing in this, but it just that happens. Like we just we have this just built into our cultural mindsets that we're at the center of our own lives. And at the root issue of that is is one of pride, right? It's this high view of self that that the view of self is is is high on our own eyes as opposed to seeing ourselves in light of creation, light of who God is and seeing ourselves as small. And that sin of pride that makes us think that we're the center of our own lives is very prevalent in this story today in the life of Saul.
that leads Saul to begin this rivalry with David that we caught a glimpse of in the reading of Psalm 59 earlier that causes all types of of chaos, death, and turmoil in all the chapters that we're about to see that come out of this rivalry. And I want us to see clearly what's happening in Saul, but also uh uh not be so distancing ourselves from the story, but actually see how this affects us as well. So, I'm going to pray for us and then we'll walk through this together. Heavenly Father, he have help us have eyes to see and ears to hear your word in a way that would not distance ourselves but would actually help us see the reality of sin, the hope of the Gospel that would lead us into worshiping you and to delighting in you and to hoping in you above all things in Jesus name. Amen.
All right, we're going to start in verse one of chapter 18. As soon as he had finished speaking to Saul, so this is coming after last week, David and Goliath defeats Goliath, cuts his head off, head in hand, talking to Saul. That's right. This is what's happening. Okay.
As soon as he had finished speaking to Saul, the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David. And Jonathan loved him as his own soul. So Jonathan, the son of King Saul, sees David head in hand and says, "We just became best friends." That That's my boy right there. Like I watched him take Goliath out. Like this is happening.
And they are knitted together. And we're not going to spend time on it this week. We'll come back to this passage in a couple of weeks. But we're going to see this friendship of Jonathan and David and how it's a beautiful picture of friendship in the Scriptures. But verse two, and Saul took him that day and would not let him return to his father's house.
Then Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as his own soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was on him and gave it to David and his armor and even his sword and his bow and his belt. And David went out and was successful wherever Saul sent him, so that Saul set him over the men of war. And this was good in the sight of all the people and also in the sight of Saul's servants. So David is brought into the inner circle of Saul.
I mean, he's he's brought into the inner circle, and this is the only time when things are good between Saul and and David. there moments of of peace against the backdrop of a rivalry. But the rivalry has not begun yet. Things are actually for the moment good. And also, as we're going to see, David is going to continue to gain favor.
God has shown favor to David. He's shown judgment to Saul, and he's going to keep getting favor with the people. Even the servants of Saul, everyone is favoring David. And Saul is going to quickly realize this. Verse six.
As they were coming home, when David returned from striking down the Philistine, the women came out of all the cities of Israel singing and dancing to meet King Saul with tambourines, with songs of joy, and with musical instruments. So, this is also common. This is what happened. Men would go off to war. They'd come back and they're victorious.
The women would be in the streets dancing and singing with tambourine. And King Saul undoubtedly has experienced this. He's won victories. He's seen this scene before. It feels familiar.
And then they begin to sing. Verse 7. And the women sang to one another as they celebrated. Saul has struck down his thousands and David his 10 thousands. So they start praising Saul and Saul hears the first line and it's like, "Yes, I like this song.
It's a It's a banger. This what I I like what I'm hearing." And then the next line is sung. Saul has killed his thousands. David is 10 thousands. And it immediately becomes the worst song he's ever heard.
He's just I I hate this song. And it's like, I mean, you kill one man. He's a big man. You kill one man and all of a sudden the people shift and now you're getting all the attention, all the affection, all the favor. And he's furious.
He's furious. Verse eight. And Saul was very angry and this saying displeased him. He said, "They have ascribed to David 10 thousands and to me they've ascribed thousands and what more can he have but the kingdom?" And Saul eyed David from that day on. So two things are clear.
Saul is blinded by his own pride. He can only see himself in this situation. He can only focus on his greatness being infringed upon by David. So, first thing is he's blinded by his own pride.
Second, from context here, he's known Saul for quite some time that Samuel went and anointed someone else to be king. My guess is he's probably been scanning Israel wondering who is the person that's going to come forward that's going to become the next king. And the moment he begins to hear that David has his 10,000s, the moment he begins to see the people shifting their favor towards David, he's beginning to put the pieces together and he says, "What more can he have but the kingdom." So he's starting to realize David is this anointed future king. And the rivalry begins. The era of peace between them, very shortlived, is over.
And from this point forward, Saul views David as a real threat and rival. Verse 10, the next day, a harmful spirit rushed upon Saul and he raved within his house while David was playing the liar as he did day by day. So, first part, Isaac covered this a few weeks ago, this language of harmful spirit from God that rushed upon Saul. It's either an evil spirit that God is sovereign over that comes and afflicts Saul or it is a a good spirit that comes and brings harm upon Saul. So Isaac walked through those.
You can listen to it more depth a couple of weeks ago in his sermon. But the same net thing happens. God in his sovereignty has desired to bring judgment upon Saul. And this harmful spirit is afflicting him. And he raved with madness in his house.
and David is there to play the liar. So, if you don't know what a liar is, I got a picture of one. This is a recent liar, okay? It's just an instrument. And David is playing this instrument.
And it's there to kind of soothe the the inner madness that's taking over in Saul's mind. And then as he's playing, he attempts to murder him. Saul had his spear in his hand. And Saul hurled the spear for he thought, "I will pin David to the wall." But David evaded him twice. So Saul hurls a spear.
He evaded him twice. I don't know if he missed the first time, picked it back up through it again. I don't know if this is the magic spear theory that just somehow ricocheted and came back. Don't understand what's happening here, but he evades him twice. And Saul is in 10th commandment breaking the tenth commandment and coveting the attention that David is getting.
It has led to now breaking the sixth commandment attempted murder that he wants to kill and murder David. But David again has favor from God. It's not that David is so agile that he can just dip, dodge, dug all the things, dodge. He can. It's it's that God has favor upon him.
Verse 12, Saul was afraid of David because the Lord was with him but had departed Saul. Saul removed him from his presence and made him a commander of a thousand. And he went out and came in before the people. So Saul removes him because the favor has left him and he doesn't want him in in a circle and he says, "I I'll make you a commander of a thousand. at least keeps you away from me.
And it says he went in and came out before the people, which is just the language of he led the people. That's what that means. He led the people in and out of battle. Verse 14. And David had success in all his undertakings, for the Lord was with him.
And when Saul saw that he had great success, he stood in fearful all of him. But all Israel and Judah loved David for he went out and came in before them. So you get this repeated phrasing of the Lord was with him. It's this the text is telling us this. The favor is with David.
The Lord is with him. He's not with Saul. He's with David. And the nation loves him. His own tribe Judah, the whole whole of Israel, they love David.
He wins battles. He leads the people. God has given him favor with the people. And Saul begins to think, "How can I politic my way through this in a way that will end out end up in his own favor?" Verse 17. Then Saul said to David, "Here is my eldest daughter, Merb.
I will give her to you for a wife. Only be valiant for me and fight the Lord's battles. For Saul thought, "Let not my hand be against him, but let the hand of the Philistines be against him." So, back in 1st Samuel 17 last week, we saw that it was it was said that if if whoever defeats Goliath, they're they're going to be able to marry into the family of Saul. He's going to give one of his daughters to. And now that's happening.
And this good offer of giving his daughter Merb to David disguises ill intent because what he wants to do is he wants the Philistines to be against David because he wants the Philistines to be the one that takes David out. So, he's using his daughter as a means to mess with David, ultimately get him removed from the situation, which means that he's trying to outmaneuver God in this situation because God has shown who the king is going to be. He's shown who his favor is upon and he thinks he can outmaneuver God. That's Saul's position. David responds to this much differently.
Verse 18, and David said to Saul, "Who am I? and who are my relatives, my father's clan in Israel, that I should be son-in-law to the king?" David responds and says, "Who am I? I I'm unworthy to be your son-in-law." To Mary and to the king's family like, "I'm lowly." He responds with humility. And in contrast to Saul's pride, David responds in humility, lowering himself as Saul raises himself up. Saul sees this and then he responds with really arrogant disdain against David.
Verse 19, but at the time when Marb Saul's daughter should have been given to David, she was given to Adriel the Mahalite for a wife. So he dangles marriage and he says, "Ah, no. and then he gives her to someone else. And then while all this is happening in the background, another daughter is starting to fall in love with David. So in verse 20 it says, "Now Saul's daughter, Michael loved David.
And they told Saul, and the thing pleased him. Saul thought, "Let me give her to him that she may be a snare for him, and that the hand of the Philistines may be against him." Therefore, Saul said to David a second time, "You shall now be my son-in-law." And Saul commanded his servants, "Speak to David in private and say, "Behold, the king has delight in you, and all his servants love you. Now then, become the king's son-in-law." and Saul's servants. And Saul's servants spoke these those words in the ears of David. So Saul this time is not just going to dangle his daughter, but his his daughter's love as a means of making sure that the Philistines are going to try to take him out.
Again, he's trying to outmaneuver the favor of God. He's trying to outmaneuver the Lord in this. And David responds again in humility. And David said, "Does it seem to you a little thing to become the king's son-in-law since I'm a poor man and have no reputation?" He responds in humility, "Don't don't you see I'm I'm a lonely man." He adds, "I'm a poor man. I don't come from wealth." And then Saul hears that as an opportunity.
And the servants of Saul, verse 24, told him, "Thus, and so David, so did David speak." Verse 25. Then Saul said, "Thus you shall say to David, the king desires no bride priced except a hundred foreskins of the Philistines that he may be avenged of the king's enemies." Now Saul thought to make David fall by the hand of the Philistines. So this is foreign to us in a variety of ways. First, we're not used to we don't do bride prices. It's not something in our culture.
Their culture that was common grooms family come bring money, exchange happens, families unite, but that's foreign to us. And he hears, "Oh, you don't have you don't have to come from wealth. You don't need money. It's not a traditional bribe price. What I want is a hundred Philistine foreskins." And again, that part is foreign to us.
It may seem a little bit crude. But here is the reality of what's happening. The Jewish people under the old covenant are circumcised people. The Philistines are not. And this just in a very similar way, the Native Americans used to take scalps as a body count.
That's what this is. You This is not This is not This is unclean Philistines. This is the You have a hundred. Here we go. we can prove you've killed.
That's what's happening here. If we hear that, it's like, oh, this is foreign to us. But for them, it's not all that out of the realm of possibility. Verse 26. And when his servants told David these words, it pleased David well to be the king's son-in-law.
Before the time had expired, David arose and went along with this man and killed 200 of the Philistines. And David brought their foreskins which were given in full number to the king that he might become the king's son-in-law. And Saul gave him his daughter Michael for a wife. But when Saul saw and knew that the Lord was with David and that Michael Saul's daughter loved him, Saul was even more afraid of David. So Saul was d's enemy continually.
Then the commanders of the Philistines came out to battle. And as often as they came out, David had more success than all the servants of Saul said that his name was highly esteemed. So David hears that challenge says, "Say say no more. I'll be back soon." Comes back 200 presents it and then he's given and they are married. And then it says, every time they go out to battle, David is the one who has the most success.
He's the thorn in the Philistines signs. He's the one that the people love. He's the one that has the favor. His name was highly esteemed even amongst the servants of Saul. And as he's starting to gain more favor, Saul is growing angrier and angrier.
And this leads Saul to be more vocal about his plans to kill David. And it's not that at some point David didn't realize that Saul was trying to kill him. He had evaded him twice with the spear. So he at least understands that. But that maybe could have been attributed to, well, Saul is afflicted with this raving and he's mad and it's so that but it's about to become abundantly clear.
This is not just a one-off thing. This Saul wants your head. Starting in verse one of chapter 19. And Saul spoke to Jonathan his son, and to all his servants that they should kill David. But Jonathan, Saul's son, delighted much in David.
And Jonathan told David, "Saul, my father seeks to kill you. Therefore, be on guard in the morning. Stay in a secret place and hide yourself. And I will go out and stand beside my father in the field where you are. And I will speak to my father about you.
And if I learn anything, I will tell you to Saul at this point. He's telling Jonathan, he's telling his servants, he's being vocal. He wants David dead. Jonathan hears this and he loves his friend David. And then and he's he goes and he tells him he intercedes to to protect David from harm and he says stay out here I'll go and talk to my father but it shows a an immense love that Jonathan has for David and this is against the backdrop of Jonathan was Saul's son who was means that Jonathan was supposed to be the next in line.
So, we we'll look at this more in the in in a couple of weeks, but just Jonathan's love for David and his understanding of covenant faithfulness that David has gotten from the Lord is pretty powerful. But he goes and he intercedes and he confronts his father. Verse four. And Jonathan spoke well of David to Saul his father, and said to him, "Let not the king sin against his servant David, because he has not sinned against you, and because his deeds have brought good to you. For he took his life in his hand, and he struck down the Philistine, and the Lord worked a great salvation for all Israel.
You saw it and rejoiced. Why then will you sin against innocent blood by killing David without cause? And I so appreciate this passage for the character of Jonathan, for his love for his friend, but also the way in which he shows his father honor and corrects him that he doesn't stay silent. and he sees his father in sin and he in an honorable way with careful words corrects his father and says why are you sinning against David don't don't kill him don't murder him don't you see the good he's done for you don't you see the good he's done for this nation for our people why would you sin in this manner verse six and Saul listened to the voice of Jonathan Saul swore as the Lord lives he shall not be put to death. And Jonathan called David, and Jonathan reported to him all these things.
And Jonathan brought David to Saul, and he was in his presence as before. So Jonathan reasons with his father. His father listens, and Saul swears, "As the Lord lives, he shall not be put to death." So there's a moment here of of of peace. And this happens a few times in 1 and 2 Samuel. There's there's there's some peace But it's shortlived.
And the reason is because there are moments where Saul displays this moment of clarity and contrition. He feels sorry, but it's not true repentance because it doesn't last. He doesn't actually repent of his murderous desires, of his threats against David. This is only going to be for a moment. The rest of Saul's life is one of unrepentant covetousness that yields a consistent flow of murderous rage against David until the day that he dies.
So once that time passes, Saul reverts back to his hatred of David. And there was war again, which this happens quite a bit in this story. And this is happening over a period of years. And there was war again. And David went out and fought the Philistines, sought with the Philistines, and struck them with a great blow, so that they fled before him.
Then a harmful spirit from the Lord came upon Saul as he sat in his house with his spear in his hand. And David was playing the liar. And Saul sought to pen David to the wall with the spear. But he eluded Saul so that he struck the spear into the wall. and David fled and escaped that night.
So continues to win battles and then is also faithful enough to bring his liar and to come and play before Saul, which had to have been hard given the past history he has with Saul. But he's faithful to the anointed king. He plays and again Saul seeks to murder him. And he fled and he escaped that night. Verse 11.
Saul sent messengers to David's house to watch him that he might kill him in the morning. But Michael, David's wife, told him, "If you do not escape with your life tonight, tomorrow you will be killed." So Michael let David down the through the window and he fled away and escaped. So that right there is a good wife. She says, "Your dad, my dad's going to kill you. You got to go.
If you're here in the morning, he's going to kill you." So she lets him out through the window and he escapes away and then she's going to try to buy him some time. Verse 13, Michael took an image and laid it on the bed and put a pillow of goat's hair on its head and covered it with clothes which shows two things. The first before Ferris Beer's Day Off, before Braveheart, there was this idea of putting a dummy underneath some pillows and maneuvering away where it looks like it's a real person. This is 3,000 plus years old. Second, it is a little it kind of sticks out.
Michael took an image. That word image is the same word for idol. So, this shows there's a household idol and with them this Rachel in the Old Testament, she also with Jacob, she had household idols. So, at some point, David's going to need to leave his home better.
They're going to have to make some decisions to get rid of all these household idols. But she uses this to buy him some time. Verse 14. And when Saul sent messengers to David, she said, "He is sick." Then Saul sent the me sent the messengers to see David, saying, "Bring him up to me in the bed that I may kill him." And when the messengers came in, behold, the image was in the bed with the pillow of goat's hair at its head. Saul said to Michael, "Why have you deceived me thus, and let my enemy go so that he has escaped?" And Michael answered Saul, "He said to me, let me go.
Why should I kill you?" So she's a little deceit, little deception, saves David. He escapes and David goes to Samuel. Verse 18. Now David fled and escaped. And he came to Samuel at Rama and told him all that Saul had done to him.
And he and Samuel lived and went and lived at Naeth. And it was told Saul, "Behold, David is at Naeth and Rama." Then Saul sent messengers to take David. So even still, this is what's wild here. After all of this, he thinks that he's going to send messengers to take David from the feet of Samuel, the great prophet of the land. He thinks that he's going to go capture David.
And this this is where guys, as I'm reading 1 Samuel, this this time around, I'm just it's so clear to me Saul doesn't know God. He just doesn't know God. if he thinks that after all of this he still can go and sees David by force. He doesn't know the Lord. He doesn't know that his word is going to come to pass.
So he sends messengers to go and take him. And when they saw the company of the prophets prophesying and Samuel standing as head over them, the spirit of God came upon the messengers of Saul and they also prophesied. And it was told Saul he sent other messengers and they also prophesied. And Saul sent messengers again the third time and they also prophesy. And it's just it's wild.
God directly intercedes to defend David. And every time a group of messengers comes to take him, he defends them with prophecy. Now from the context here, this is not the traditional way in which we think about prophecy in the Old Testament. This is not the traditional sense of prophecy where they are uh foretelling something that is going to happen later. It's not that type of prophecy.
This seems to be some type of joyous praise, euphoric praise that as they get closer to David, they lose sight of the mission. Just begin and euphoric praise praising God. Every group of messengers keeps doing this. And finally Saul says, "I'm going to do it myself." Verse 22. Then he himself went to Rama and came to the great wall that is in seeu and he asked, "Where are Samuel and David?" And one said, "Behold, they're at Naith in Rama." And he went there to Naeth and Rama.
And the spirit of God came upon him also. And as he went, he prophesied until he came to Naoth and Rama. He too stripped off his clothes. And he too prophesied before Samuel and laid naked all that day and all that night. Thus it is said, "Is Saul also among the prophets?" So Saul in his arrogance thinks, "I will seize David before Samuel." And as he approaches, he falls into the same prophecy, begins this praising of God and is so humbled and humiliated before the Lord and everyone else that the king strips his clothes and says lays naked on the ground all day, all night, completely humbled and humiliated, unable to seize David.
And as you read this in its context over the next few chapters, it's just so clear like Jonathan makes it clear. There's a foreign king that knows this and I I'm you look at from the context here, Saul knows this. They all realize David is the next king. They they realize that David is the one who's going to take the throne. and he and his arrogance when the Lord has spoken his word and his will is unfolding believes that he can oppose the will of God and take out the Lord's anointed y'all.
And this like I as you're reading this, this is like if you read it through the first time, like there might even be this hope where it's just oh man, like maybe finally the Lord has broken through to his heart. He's naked on the ground just praising God, humbled, humiliated. That maybe this is the moment where he finally says, "I've had enough. I'm not supposed to be on the throne. God, you decide who's on the throne.
We'll work out some type of secession plan and David can take the throne." But no, Saul wants to be on the throne and his pride. He wants to be the one that is in control of the kingdom. He wants to be on the one who's on the throne. He opposes the decision of God when God is ultimately the one who decides he's on the throne. And we're going to see coming out of this that he will continue to oppose the Lord and his will.
And we'll continue to see an an attempt to take David out. And as I read this story and as we read it, we should consider the same prideful instinct that is within us that also seeks to take center stage on the throne. We should see the same prideful, selfc centered instinct that's prevalent in our culture and prevalent in our lives that wants to put us and place us at the seat of our lives that that wants to make us the center of our reality that wants to put us on the throne. There's a illustration I've used for years in teaching and counseling and and evangelism that I found to be incredibly helpful. It's called a throne diagram.
I'm going to show you. But before I show you, just maybe preface this. I hand drew this because I usually handdraw this. Okay?
Whether it's on my office or wherever and I'm and I'm not an artist. I we attempted for a few minutes this week to hand this to Raz and see if we could get a really cool AI generated version of this. We made a lot of progress and we never finished. So don't be distracted by the wildly distracted uh distracting uh uh lack of being able to illustrate. But I have found this to be so incredibly helpful and understanding what true lordship looks like.
So first one, get it out. Let it go. Get out the way. Okay.
So, that chair is a throne, person in the middle. Okay. Think about the aspects of your life that require the most time and energy. So, this is me.
This is family, hobbies, Church, work, friends. Okay? These are the areas of your life that get the most energy, the most of your focus, the most of your time, the most of your affection, the most of your energy, money, etc. And one of the things that happens is that as we think about our own lives, we begin to think about all these things. And some of these things can be good, some they can be bad.
Like there can be bad things in your life. There could be uh hidden sin that not everyone else sees, but but is there. It gets a lot of energy. And there can be good things like Church and being a part of a Church family and being a good husband, being a good wife, being a faithful boss. And what happens is the way that we approach the Christian life sometimes is we think, "I've just got to make these things better.
I got to be a better Church member. I got to be a better worker. Be a better boss. I got to choose good friends and be a good friend. I need to be a good wife.
I need to be a good husband. Be a good son. Be a good daughter. My hobbies need to be good. I've chosen some bad ones.
Need to kick them out. Need to bring some good ones in. And much of our effort is spent trying to fix all these things around us and make and improve all of these things. and you can live a good moral life where one day someone will preach your funeral and they will say he was such a good uh Church member that she was such a faithful wife that he was such a good friend and all everyone will celebrate and sing and think about how good of a moral person you are and you will be in judgment for eternity because if this is the life that we choose to live it leads to destruction ction because it puts us at the center and there's so many of us that can't see that clearly that we're the center of our existence that we sit on the throne and the reality is is that the Christian life is one where Jesus takes the throne. So the difference next next part of the picture on this far side this is what the Christian life is supposed to look like.
Christ becomes center in your life. When we say Gospel center that Jesus takes over the seat of existence in reality in your life and that he becomes central in every other aspect of your life so that when you are at work you seek to be not a person that's disconnected God from your work but that Christ becomes central in how you think about work. He becomes central in how you think about your friends and your family. It becomes central in your hobbies and some of the bad things in your life begin to be cleared out entirely and some of the good things in your life he begins to begin begins to take over entirely.
But those right there are two different lives. There is no middle ground. You can have it one way or the other, but you cannot have it both ways. And the reality is is that some of you have lived a life where Jesus has never taken center stage. You're like Saul.
Saul would not give up the throne. He would not give it up. And you're clinging to the throne, clinging to be the one that orders your life. And yeah, God may be a part of it. He may be an aspect of your life, but he is not your life.
and salvation and believing that Christ died the death that we deserved and conquered death at the resurrection and ascended to the right hand of God the Father from which he is now Lord and King over all creation. Salvation is not disconnected from lordship. You cannot be saved and him not be lord. That that that is not a concept. That is not a thing.
When Jesus is your savior, he is your Lord. Romans 10:9, but if because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. He is both savior and he is Lord. He is not one or the other. And faith in Christ is a surrendering to him where he takes the throne.
And some of you live good moral southern Christian lives, but that isn't following Jesus. And my hope this morning is that God would wake your eyes up to see this clearly and you would not respond like Saul, but you would respond in faith and invite Jesus to take the throne of your life and to take over every aspect of your life. Some of you have done this. You've believed in Jesus as savior and lord. You're a follower of Christ, but there are still aspects of your life that you were just closedfisted trying to stay in control of.
And it never works. It never brings joy. It never brings satisfaction. And there are parts of your life that you are still trying to do your way on your terms. For those who are married, you're trying to be trying to have marriage your way.
and and and the problems in your marriage or about the other person would just be better if they just would change here. And Jesus is like, I want I want the I want this be the center of that. I'm on the throne. Give me that. Yield it to me.
Let me be the center of your marriage. Those of you that want to be married, you have a desire to be married, you might have so many criteria for what that person needs to be, and Jesus at the center of your life isn't the main one. It's like y'all, he can have bad teeth. You can fix that later. You can't fix the fact that they don't love Christ.
That should be your overarching criteria. And everything else is so secondary, it doesn't matter. We do this with work and with school that we make school and work about the advancement of our own good as opposed to the advancement of God and being faithful what he's been given us. We do this with money. We make money about our comforts and our satisfaction, not his kingdom.
We do this with the Church that the Church that the community groups that all of it exists to serve my needs and my wants as opposed to serving God and his desire. Do this with time. You draw a bubble there and you can say, "No, my time is precious." Even the phrase, "My time is an indictment that we don't understand that it's the Lord's." So, you should consider all the different aspects of your life and begin to ask the Lord, where have you not taken center stage? And then as God reveals that to us in repentance, we go, Lord, take it. May I not be like Saul who cling to a seat of power that did not belong to him.
May I yield everything in my life so that you can be Lord. The band's going to come up and we get to close in worship. And as we close in song, may we let the reality of the Gospel infiltrate the core of who we are and every aspect of our lives. Which means that some of you need to be honest about where you are. But there are two different thrones and either you're on it or he is.
And my hope this morning is that you'd ask some very difficult questions of the Lord to reveal where where where are you? Are you like Saul clinging to a throne that is not yours? Or have you yielded to Christ? And for all of us who are Christians who have failed in so many ways to yield control to Christ, my hope this morning that as we worship, you begin to reveal some of that sin in our lives. That as we meet in our community groups this week, that we begin to see the ways in which we need to change and we would open our hands to the lordship of Christ in every aspect of our lives.
Let me pray. Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us see you at work in our lives in a way that would change our hearts. God, save those that have not yielded the throne to you. May you be king of their lives this morning. And for everyone else, may we walk joyfully in repentance, knowing that though there are parts of us that don't we don't want to give it up.
There are parts of us that don't want to give up the throne, we know that your way is better than our way. Lord, help us walk in faith and repentance in Jesus name. Amen.
1 Samuel 17
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. Grab a Bible and go to First Samuel, chapter 17. We're working our way through the book of 1 Samuel.
It'll be on page 137. If you grab one of the blue Bibles that is um in the seat in front of you, if you grab one of the black Bibles, the words will be bigger, but I don't know what page it'll be on. Uh go to 1st Samuel chapter 17. If you don't own a Bible, you can take one of those blue ones home with you. Uh we want you to have a Bible.
We want you to read it. We are working our way, like I said, through the book of 1st Samuel. And today, we've made it to the story of David and Goliath. If if you don't know much about the Bible, you've probably heard of David and Goliath, even if it was only in connection to like a a sports event where they said it was a real David and Goliath story. But that that you you've heard of this.
And one of the things that we're going to see as we go through this is that there's a certain way that because of our understanding of the New Testament that we are to see and to read this text. There are uh there are some movies that have twist endings and there they there's such a twist ending that you can't ever watch the movie the same way twice. But the really good ones make you want to go back. The really good ones like you're like what?
No. And then you want to go back and see, did that was that real? Did that really show up in the And then you watch it and the really good ones you're like, oh wow, yeah. Okay.
Um, and so what I'd like to do is is list off all those and tell you what the twist is real quick and just ruin about seven movies for you. No, I'm just kidding. But there is something too when we see the New Testament and we see the the Revelation of the mystery of Christ that when we come back to the Old Testament, there's certain places where we go, "Hold on a second. There's something else going on here. God's doing something bigger here.
And this is one of those stories. So, I'm excited. We're going to just walk through the text, walk through the story, see how it fits inside of the narrative for of First Samuel, and then we're going to see how it fits inside of what God does in redemptive history. So, uh, let's ask the Lord for some help and let's get started because we got a whole chapter to go through.
Lord, we ask we ask for help. Um, we ask that your spirit would be at work so that we might listen. Lord, we're so heart of hearing and our hearts are so often dull. So we pray that your spirit would be at work that we might hear your voice that we might follow you in obedience and faith and that we might delight in Christ this morning in Jesus name. Amen.
Uh, chapter 17 verse one. Now the Philistines gathered their armies for battle and they were gathered at Soo which belongs to Judah and encamped between Soo and Azaka in Ephesam. So they've already encroached on Judah's territory. So the Philistines have already marched in. They're encamped in an area that belongs to Judah, but they're already there.
In verse two it says, "And Saul and the men of Israel were gathered and encamped in the valley of Ela and drew up in line of battle against the Philistines. And the Philistines stood on the mountain on the one side and Israel stood on the mountain on the other side with a valley between them. So they've reached a stalemate. The Philistines are moving in. This is constant.
The people they would gather for war, go to war. They're always fighting over territory. This is we'll see as we keep going through 1 and 2 Samuel, this is just non-stop. They're always fighting. Um, but they they reach a spot where they're on one mountain and there's a valley in between them that's actually a really it's the valley that kind of helps you get into the hill country of Judah.
So they it's the best place for them to come in, but they're on a mountain and now the army of Israel is on the other mountain and there's a valley in between. first army to go down into the valley has a tactical disadvantage. So if you want to charge into battle by running down into the valley and back up, it's it's bad for you. Uh fighting people uphill is bad. It's harder to fight uphill.
People running downhill that you have more momentum and also you can reach their feet and they can reach your head. So it's it's not a good setup. So what they've done is parked on two mountains with a valley in between and then what? Stare at each other down and to see who's going to go first. And for the Israelites, this is kind of good.
They've stopped the advance of the Philistines and we're kind of stuck here. Verse four. And there came out from the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span. And you're like, "What?
Six cubits?" Yes. And a span, you guys. A cubit is about 18 inches. A span is about nine. He's 9 foot n in tall.
What? Six cubits in a span. Yes, he's 9 foot n in tall. This man is massive. He comes out from them and it says he's a champion.
And we're going to see what that means where he's going to say, "I will fight on behalf of our entire army. You send forth someone who will fight on behalf of your army." That's a champion. No need. Neither one of us is going to charge down into this valley. Well, we can fix this.
Just send out your best guy. That's what he's going to do. That's what he's going to holler at them to do. And we're going to find out a little more about him. So, 9 foot 9 in tall.
And it's going to tell us more about him. It says this. He had a helmet of bronze on his head and he was armed with a coat of male. And the weight of the coat was 5,000 shekels of bronze. That's 125 pounds.
If you're like my wife and I and you stay up on the weekends and watch cop shows, um, what'll happen a lot of times when a police officer catches someone, which they do periodically, they'll announce to that person how heavy their belt is. They'll say, "I caught you and I'm wearing a 25 pound belt." They usually say like this, "I caught you and but they they this guy has 125 pounds of just his chain mail, not including his helmet. He's he is wearing a massive amount of armor. Some of the people in this room weigh 125 pounds or less than 125 pounds. He He wears you into battle.
All right. He had bronze armor on his legs and a javelin of bronze slung between his shoulders. The shaft of his spear was like a weaver's beam. And his spear's head weighed 600 shekels of iron. That's 15 pounds.
I I'm going to go out on a limb and saying getting stabbed by any spear is bad. A 15lb spearhead is over. And his shieldbearer went before him. So, he had somebody just carry his shield out.
Now, if he's anything like Dwayne the Rock Johnson, that shield bear is about 4 feet tall, just to add to the intensity level of what he looks like when he comes walking out. I want to show y'all a picture of someone who is 8' 11 in tall. Goliath makes him look small. So, when I said it's bad to fight uphill, Goliath is always on his own hill.
You can reach his bronze shield greaves, shin greaves, but he's up here. The parts that you need to get to are far away. This is a difficult place, difficult person to fight. He is massive. Now, I don't want to give anything away.
If you haven't heard the story and you don't know where this is going, but there's a reason why they know exactly how much all of his stuff weighed. They're going to have a lot of access to it later. He didn't come out and announce it. They got that stuff later and waited and we're like, "Look at how big this is." All right.
Anyway, sorry. Where are we at? Uh, okay. So, his shield bearer went before him.
Verse eight, he stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel, "Why have you come out to draw up for battle? Am I not a Philistine? And are you not servants of Saul? Choose a man for yourselves and let him come down to me. If he is able to fight with me and kill me, then we will be your servants.
But if I prevail against him and kill him, then you shall be our servants and serve us. And the Philistines said, "I defy the ranks of Israel this day. Give me a man that we may fight together." She says, "Send out someone." He wins. We surrender. I win.
You surrender. Send me a man. Verse 11. When Saul and all Israel heard these words of the Philistine, they were dismayed and greatly afraid. The tone of this standoff has changed because before it was a tactical disadvantage to march down into the Nobody's going to do that, be silly.
They'd write about you in the history books and say you were stupid. But now every single man there has been personally challenged and had to decide I'm a coward. I'm not doing that. And it seems like they didn't even all they're just dismayed. It's like none of them even thought that was an option.
We don't even have someone who Jonathan's not going. We've seen that he none of them are just it just is it doesn't seem like there's any shame upon Saul to not go. It just is like well this is but now we're just sitting here. He's given us a way to to navigate through this but nobody's going to go. That's the situation that they're in.
Verse 12. Now David was the son of an Ephrothite of Bethlehem and Judah named Jesse who had eight sons. In the days of Saul, the man was already old and advanced in years. This he's not out with the army. He's home.
The three oldest sons of Jesse had followed Saul to the battle. And the names of his three sons who went to the battle were Eliab, the firstborn, and next to him, Abinadab, and the third, Shama. David was the youngest. The three eldest followed Saul, but David went back and forth from Saul to feed his father's sheep at Bethlehem. So, if you remember from chapter 16, David's met Saul, and he's been playing music for him, but he hasn't just stayed with Saul.
It even said at one point he was his armor bearer, but he hasn't gone into this battle with him. He's back and forth, and now he's back with his dad tending sheep, but his three brothers have gone for 40 days. The Philistine came forward and took his stand morning and evening, every day. In the morning, he would walk down and do this. And in the evening, he would walk down and do this.
So, for 40 days, the armies would line up. He would defy them, curse them, mock them. I It doesn't tell us. I assume he came up with new ones over time, challenge them, and for 40 days, so 80 times, nobody's answering this. It's it's a long that's a long time to mentally have to decide I'm not the person for this.
Everybody's really settled in. We don't know what we're going to do. Nobody has a plan. But they've all had to deal with the fact that they they they are insufficient. They cannot do this.
Nobody stepped up. Verse 17. So, but they've been gone for a while. And that's what leads to this next part. And Jesse said to David his son, "Take for your brothers an epha of this parched grain and these 10 loaves and carry them quickly to the camp of your brothers.
Also, take these 10 cheeses to the commander of their thousand. See if your brothers are well and bring some token from them." Couple of things. Uh the grain he sends is just he's trying to help feed them, make sure they're eating enough. It's not very expensive or nice things. He does send 10 cheeses to the commander of a thousand, which I think we've lost this as a gift, but I think 10 cheeses would be a great gift to give somebody.
So, just, you know, hey, I just picked you out 10 different types of cheese. I mean, you know, that sounds wonderful. And then he says, bring back some token. We're going to see later David does show up with a token. Is it different than what he thinks?
Okay. Verse 19. Now Saul and they and all the men of Israel were in the valley of Ela fighting with the Philistines. And David rose early in the morning and left the sheep with the keeper and took the provisions and went as Jesse had commanded him. And he came to the encampment as the host was going out to the battle line shouting the war cry.
So he shows up about the time they're all geared up walking out shouting. And it seems like they probably did this every day. Get your gear on. We're going to go out and be like, "Ah, we'll fight you except for that one specific guy." And also, no, we're not going to do that.
Then the Philistine comes out, defies them, and they just kind of hang out. But it seems like every day they went and shouted on the mountain. We're like, we're still here. Uh 21. And Israel and the Philistines drew up for battle, army against army.
And David left the things in charge of the keeper of the baggage, and ran to the ranks and went and greeted his brothers. And isn't that just what it's like with a younger brother? You are you're in line for battle. And he just shows up. He's like, "Hey, where's your commander?
I got cheese for him, you know. But he just runs up into the ranks and starts talking to him. But it does seem like a little bit like this is a little pump. They're just kind of doing it, but they're not about to fight. So David comes over and starts talking to his brother.
Then it says this, verse 23, as he talked with them, behold the champion, the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name, came up out of the ranks of the Philistines and spoke the same words as before. and David heard them. I love that line. He's been saying this over and over again. The only difference this time is that David heard them.
And immediately David's like, "Oh, hold up." All the men of Israel when they saw the man fled from him and were much afraid. So they just they back up. I don't know if they break rakes and run. It says they flee from him, but I don't know if this is just kind of a a posture of cowardice, but it says that they flee from him. It says, "And the men of Israel said, "Have you seen this man who has come up?
Surely he has come up to defy Israel. And the king will enrich the man who kills him with great riches and will give him his daughter and make his father's house free in Israel. He won't have to pay taxes. Probably won't have to join battles." And David said to the men who stood by him, "What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel?
For who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? And the people answered him in the same way, so shall it be done to the man who kills him. So David immediately frames this up in covenantal language. He's an uncircumcised Philistine. He's not a part of the covenant people, and he's defying the armies of the living God.
He's brought reproach on Israel by defying the armies of the living God. David's thinking about this differently than it seems like they are. Now Eliab, his eldest brother, heard when he spoke to the men. And Eli's anger was kindled against David. And he said,"Wh have you come down?
And with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your presumption and the evil of your heart, for you have come down to see the battle." And David said, "What have I done now?" Was it not but a word? And he turned away from him and toward another and spoke in the same way. And the people answered him again as before. Now, if you'll remember, Eliab was the tallest, bestl looking brother who Samuel thought, surely this is the one who's chosen.
He's not chosen. None of the other brothers are chosen. And then David is chosen. Well, David shows up and thinks about this differently, approaches this differently, starts talking differently, and in some ways alive just has to deal with the fact that he hasn't stood up to this challenge. He doesn't like the way David's talking, and he just starts accusing David of things.
And you can tell, you can just read in the conversation, there's a little bit of tension here that seems to be ongoing because David doesn't say, "What did I do?" He says, "What did I do now?" And then he said, "Isn't it just a word?" He said, "I asked the question, why are you fussing at me?" But if you're I don't if you come from a family where there's a lot of children, you end up I think David's ended up with multiple fathers. Like I know my older son tries to parent his brother who's three years apart. Well, Eliab and David, they're way apart. So, I think David's just like, "What is going on?
Why am I being fussed at?" But David just moves on, starts asking someone else, and they answer the same way. Verse 31, when the words that David spoke were heard, they repeated them before Saul, and he sent for him. I think this is interesting, but word gets to the king. Hey, there's a person here who isn't really scared. He's asking some questions.
He talked about the armies of the living God. He caused him an uncircumcised Philistine. He didn't seem scared. He seemed I just we thought we'd let you know. Like word gets to Saul to the point that David is brought to him.
David said to Saul, "Let no man's heart fail because of him. Your servant will go and fight with this Philistine." So he goes in and sees Saul and says, "Y'all don't need to be afraid. I'll go fight him. I've been here for 12 seconds. I heard this guy once and he's going to need to die.
And Saul said to David, "You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him, for you are but a youth." And he has been a man of war from his youth. He says, "You're you're young. He's been doing this since he was young." Like you can't you can't David's not even with the army. He's been watching sheep. It's not this isn't he just is like, "What are you talking?
You can't go do that. I can't send you forward. That won't work. But David said to Saul, "Your servant used to keep sheep for his father. And when there came a lion or a bear and took a lamb from the flock, I went after him and struck him and delivered it out of his mouth.
And if he arose against me, I caught him by his beard and struck him and killed him. Your servant has struck down both lions and bears. And this uncircumcised Philistine shall be like one of them, for he has defied the armies of the living God. Okay.
David says, "Y'all don't need to be afraid. I'll go fight him." Saul says, "You can't do that." And David says, "So, I'm a shepherd." Sometimes bears or lions come and they take sheep. When they do that, I pop them and I tell them, "No, and I get that sheep back. And if they bow up at me, I grab their beard and kill them. You know how you grab a lion by the beard for murdering purposes.
And then he's like, I noticed Goliath has a beard. He's not anchoring this in himself. He is talking about his experiences, but he's saying he's defied God. It His fight's not with me. I'll go.
His fight's not with me. And this is what he says. He struck down both lions and bears. He says he's he has defied the armies of the living God. Verse 37.
And David said, "The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of the Philistine." And Saul said to David, "Go and the Lord be with you." So David says, "The Lord's delivered me from all of that. He'll deliver me from this. He said, "I've seen him at work before in my life. I know what he's like. I know what this guy's done and he's already he's already stepped all in it.
He's already defied the Lord. This is I'll just be the one who goes." And so Saul said to David, "Go and the Lord be with you." He sees the Lord at work in him. He sees the only person who seems to want to volunteer for this job. And I don't think David blinks. He seems confident.
He says, "Okay, yeah, the Lord be with you." Verse 38. Then Saul clothed David with his armor. He put a helmet of bronze on his head and clothed him with a coat of male. And David strapped his sword over his armor, and he tried to go in vain, for he had not tested them. Then David said to Saul, "I cannot go with these, for I have not tested them." So David put them off.
Okay. I have a personal bone to pick with every cartoon I've ever seen of David and Goliath. in the cartoons, which I know you're gonna be surprised aren't super accurate all the time. What happens in this moment is that little shepherd boy, David, who usually looks like he's 11. Saul takes his Saul was the biggest guy in the Israelite army.
He was the tallest person in Israel. Saul puts his armor on David and David looks like a child in adult armor and then goes, "I can't move." With his little arm sticking out like a turtle or something. That bothers me because that's really stupid. And I don't think Saul would be like, "Here's massive armor that doesn't fit you. Good luck." It would have fit reasonably well.
Now, it may have been Saul's actual armor because they didn't have a lot of armor, but it would have fit in an intelligent manner. He what it says, David doesn't say, "I can't take these because they're way too big." He says, "I can't take them because I haven't tested them." He says, "I don't know how to fight an armor. I don't I don't use a sword. I don't This is This is all weird for me. I'm not used to a helmet like that.
Today is not the day to learn how to use this stuff. I appreciate it, but it's not it's not going to happen. And in some ways, there is this disconnect even he's not even going to be bearing. He doesn't even wear Saul's uniform. Saul's not connected to this at all.
David's going to walk out only David. So, that's happening in this as well. It's a little bit layered in, but the reasoning being I haven't tested them. He takes it off. Verse 40.
Then he took his staff in his hand and chose five smooth stones from the brook and put them in his shepherd's pouch. His sling was in his hand. And he approached the Philistine. Sling, twisted leather cord, pouch in the middle. You have one side that's going to stay connected to your hand and one side that you're going to release.
Swing. A lot of times you spin to get more momentum, then you release one side of the pouch and the rock flies out way faster than you could ever throw it. That's what it's talking about. So he had a sling and they would use these in battle. And we see later where they're used in battle.
Verse 41. And the Philistine moved forward and came near to David. So David comes walking out. For the first time in 40 days, something different starts happening. Someone starts heading down and Goliath had said come down to me.
Which means I think that Goliath was walking down into the valley. So it's almost like stadium setup. There's a valley down here. There's an army up here. There's an army up there.
And David starts walking down the hill. This hadn't happened. Tone changes. And the Philistine moved forward and came near to David with his shieldbearer in front of him. And when the Philistine looked and saw David, he disdained him.
for he was but a youth ruddy and handsome in appearance. You ever see someone so attractive it makes you angry? Goliath walks down there and they've sent someone pretty out to fight him. You know how like if someone sets you up on a blind date, they've gauged you. You can tell where they think you rank or whatever.
So when David comes walking down, that's what that's what Goliath is dealing with. Y'all, this this is who he he's mad. He wanted their biggest baddest. He wants some gnarly looking. What is What?
What? So he hate he's he's infuriated. It's dis it's disrespectful to send David down here. He disdained him. Verse 43.
And the Philistines said to David, "Am I a dog that you come to me with sticks?" And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. So he's mad that he's carrying a stick. It's just just he doesn't even what? And he just starts cursing him. And the Philistines said to David, "Come to me and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field." Then David said to the Philistine, "You come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied." So he says, "You come to me with a stick." And he said, "No, not a stick." He says, "First of all, you're outfitted with as much military might as you can find.
You got a sword, a spear, and a javelin. I'm not coming to you with anything except for the name of the Lord of hosts. You've defied the Lord. That's the response. This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand.
And I will strike you down and cut off your head. And I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth. That all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel. And that all this assembly may know that the Lord saves not with sword and spear. For the battle is the Lord's and he will give you into our hand.
He says, "You come to me and I'm going to feed you to the birds." David says, "I'm going to come to you. I'm going to cut off your head and we're going to kill everyone behind you. And then everyone will know that there's a God and the battle belongs to him. And I'm here in his name." Now, if you're an Israelite, I I don't know how you feel about David headed down there.
You You were afraid to go. David's going. He doesn't You don't know him. There's been a lot of, I'm sure, whispering about him, somebody who's willing to go. He does say he's going in the name of the Lord.
And if for faithful Israelites, they would understand that's good and that God can deliver. I think if you're a Philistine, you're about as confident as you can possibly be. Imagine like a Clemson fan but worse. Just so confident. But you you you're David's coming down.
He doesn't have armor. He doesn't have anything. He even if you can't hear what they're saying, just the tone of their voice. Have y'all ever heard Andre the Giant talk?
Like when Giants talk, it's like a this is a booming I'm just saying they would sing in different parts of the choir like when David responds. I just think it hits your ear differently. And I think there's quiet. So we're waiting to see what's going to happen. 48 When the Philistine arose and came and drew near to meet David, David ran quickly toward the battle line, the battle line to meet the Philistine.
And David put his hand in his back, took out a stone, slung it, and struck the Philistine on his forehead. The stone sank into his forehead, and he fell on his face to the ground. Goliath starts marching forward. You're like, "Here we go." David starts running. He does a thing, and Goliath falls over.
They're not even near each other yet. Maybe you would have known the motions of what just happened, but Goliath is now on his face like that. So, David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and with a stone and struck the Philistine and killed him. There was no sword in the hand of David. So, it's just saying that when David entered into this, he had no weapon.
He He wins with a sling and a stone. It does say he killed him, but it's going to tell us in a second that he killed him. So, I think that this is like a summary statement of David prevails with a slinging stone and kills Goliath. Killing being summary statement because it's going to tell us he kills him in a second with Goliath's sword. So, it says 51.
Then David ran, stood over the Philistine, which I would assume the the Philistines are still trying to see is Goliath going to move, is he going to do something? You know, you have those moments where you're like, something could happen. What? What?
And David stands on top of him, took his sword, drew it out of its sheath, killed him, and cut off his head with it. When the Philistines saw that their champion was dead, they fled. And the men of Israel and Judah rose with a shout and pursued the Philistines as far as Gath and the gates of Echrron, so that the wounded Philistines fell on the way from Sherim, as far as Gath and Echron. And the people of Israel came back from chasing the Philistines, and they plundered their camp. And David took the head of the Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem, but he put his armor in his tent.
Okay, a whole lot just happened there. Hits him with a stone. Goliath falls on his face. I don't know if he spun backwards and fell on his face or if he was moving forward. When he got hit, he just fell forward, but he he's laying on face down.
David pulls his sword out, kills him, cuts his head off. Everybody's watching this for a shocked 35 seconds, minute. I don't know how long it took him to get all the sword out and do all the stuff he did. David, it's over. And when that happens, the Philistines break and run.
They have no intent on being servants. They're just trying to get out of there. Then the Israelites take off after them and just start. This is this is the most casualties in these kind of battles happen when somebody when the team breaks and runs because they're just easier to kill as they're running away. So they chase them just wherever they can chase them all the way back to their cities.
Then they come back and plunder everything. David. My my understanding of what it means that he took the head to Jerusalem and put the armor in his tent was that David on that day took the armor in his tent and that from then on he Goliath's head traveled with him. So when I said he brought a token to his dad, he was like went well. The brothers are fine.
Cheeses were a big hit. Verse 55. As soon as Saul saw David go out against the Philistine, he said to Abnner, the commander of the army, Abnner, whose son is this youth? And Abnner said, as your soul lives, O king, I do not know. Abnner is Saul's uncle who's the commander of his army.
The there is a little bit of wait. I thought Saul knew David. Yeah, he does know David, but also Saul is a king. who's older. And I'm sure he was like, "Hey, nice to meet you.
What's your dad's name?" And then completely forgot that. So that later when David's going out to do this, Saul goes, "Who? Wait, who is this kid again?" Like he just he knows who he is. He knows David. He's met him.
He's played music for him. But I just think he didn't apparently didn't keep up with all this stuff. And now he's figuring out, well, who's this household? We've got to bless his dad. We got to bless this family.
We got to know where they're coming from. What position is he in? We got to know all of that. So I think that's why he's asking And the king, verse 56, said, "Inquire whose son the boy is. And as soon as David returned from striking down the Philistine, Abner took him, brought him before Saul with the head of the Philistine in his hand." Hadn't let that go.
And Saul said to him, "Who son are you, young man?" And David answered, "I am the son of your servant Jesse the Bethlehemite." David, not not long before this, walked in and said, "Don't be afraid of Goliath." And then he walks back in the next time, holding his head and says, "I'm the son of Jesse the Bethleamite." This in 1 Samuel as we're following the story, we know that David's been anointed. He's going to be king. We know that the spirit's on him and he's moving in that direction. This is David's introduction to the nation of Israel. From here on, everybody knows who David is.
And this is actually this moment, it's going to happen very quickly, where Saul's very thankful for David and then their relationship immediately just breaks. And we'll see that as we go into the next chapter. But this is the thing that propels David into who he is, what he's going to do, moving towards being king. And on the national in the national psyche, they understand who he is and what's going on and his connection to Saul from this day forward. It says he stays with him.
He's going to keep moving forward. Now, when we read this text, I I think there's times where we look and go, "Okay, so I want to be like David." I think that's reasonable response. I want to I want to be like that. I want to be able to in the face of opposition and fear. I want to trust God.
And I think we could say that you should trust God the way David trusts God. You should be able to see the times that he's provided in the past and apply that to the future. You should be able to say, "I know he's protecting me from this. I know he can protect me in this." You should be able to face anything trusting that God is good and that he provides and that he protects. But I don't think the primary thing that's happening in this story, the primary thing that we should get out of it is if you could just be like David, you could face down any giant in your life.
I I don't think that that's in tune with the rest of the Scriptures. I said earlier that we've read the whole Bible. So, we can't read it the same way twice. Once you know what's happening in the mystery being revealed in Christ, you can't read this the same way and come out of it with we should all go be like David. Because the storyline of the Bible, the story line of the Gospel, the hope that's fulfilled in Christ is not you can be like David.
And y'all, this is actually wonderful news. What's happening here, what we get to see here is so much better and so much more beautiful than if you'll navigate everything well. If you'll be the one who stands among a h 100red thousand, who's confident enough, who trusts enough, then everything will work out for there's something so much more beautiful happening here that as we read this with New Testament understanding, there should have been a moment when we were going, "Oh my goodness. God's going to do this again. There's going to be a son of Jesse from Bethlehem that nobody expects who's going to go save again.
There's going to be someone that God sends that you wouldn't have thought could do this that when people ran into him, they said, "This this isn't you're you're you're nothing. You can't do this." But he's going to do this again. That we can almost see flashes of when David's headed down the hill holding on to a staff. You can almost see Christ headed up the hill holding on to a cross because God's going to send forth a champion again. That's the story of the Bible.
That's the hope of the Bible. Not that we would all be like David. That's not the hope. The Gospel message is so much better. It's that there is someone who was like David, Jesus Christ, who came when there was no hope of solving the problem.
Who showed up from the most unlikely setup. When there was nobody who could fix this. When everybody else had failed and had to stare into the face of I can't do this, there was somebody who showed up who accomplished it for us. that Jesus conquers the giant of sin and death and hell. This is the New Testament authors in Acts chapter 13.
Paul is preaching and he says, "Then they asked for a king and God gave them Saul, the son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, for 40 years. And when he had removed him, he raised up David to be their king, of whom he testified and said, "I have found in David, the son of Jesse, a man after my heart, who will do all my will." Of this man's offspring, God has brought to Israel a savior, Jesus, as he promised. So he says, "David, the son of Jesse, comes and that God has worked through that line and brought about Jesus." And then he finishes, he goes through and he starts quoting these things that they think are about David. And he says, "That's not about David. about Christ.
And he says, "Let it be known to you therefore, brothers, that through this man forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you, and by him everyone who believes is freed from everything from which you could not be freed by the law of Moses." He says, "Jesus has gone before us. He offers forgiveness of sins and we're made free because of him." We get to watch Jesus go out to battle and then we get to run and plunder. We get the spoils that he won. We get the victory that he won. We get the hope that he grants.
That we have a champion. That we should look at this and go, "How wonderful is it that someone shows up and accomplishes this. That someone shows up and saves." And that we have that in Christ infinitely more, eternally sealed, ultimately accomplished. This is why Jesus says, "Come to me all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest." Because what qualifies us for Jesus, what qualifies you for a champion is being insufficient. Are you weary?
Have you looked at yourself and thought, "I can't do this. I don't know how to fix this. I'm trying. I can't I can't straighten myself out." This is one of the things that happens every once in a while. I'm the one who's caused me more problems than anybody else.
I've lied to myself more. I've sinned more. I've twisted things up more. Even the people I really love are just the people I get closest to me so I can hurt the best. It's really messed up, but that's how that works so often.
And what I don't need is a bigger, better, stronger, more powerful version of me. I I don't want to look in the situation and go, I in the middle of my sin, I just need more me. if we just have more me here. It's like, no, I need Christ. I need a redeemer.
I need hope. I need a champion. And we get to look as we read stories like this and go, "Praise be to Jesus that he went before us and that we get to follow after him." And if you're here this morning because you're trying to straighten yourself out, you're trying to be enough, do enough, fix it. What I would say is the Gospel is such better news than that. You have a champion in Christ who has gone before you and accomplish the victory.
And all you need to do is trust him and get behind him. That's the hope. Let's pray. Father, we thank you. We thank you that we see in this story how you save and how you provide a champion for yourself to deliver your people.
We we thank you that you go out of your way multiple times in this text to say he's a son of Jesse. He's a son of Jesse. He's a son of Jesse. So that when you point forward and say there's going to be a root of the tribe of Jesse who's going to bring salvation, we can know that you're doing something here. We're thankful, Lord, that the battle is yours, not ours.
And that victory is yours, not ours. And that someone went before us in faith and obedience to secure a victory that we could not earn. So Lord, may your name be praised, may you be glorified, may you be honored. May you be submitted to. May you be worshiped.
May you be obeyed. May there be delight and joy in the hearts of your people as we consider your works and your salvation and the hope that is found in you. And for every person here who is trying to save themselves, may they surrender to the victory of Christ. May his blood cover them. May forgiveness of sins be applied to them.
May your spirit be at work to free them from all the things that could not they could not be freed from under the law. May they trust you. And this is all to the praise of your glorious grace and your wonderful name. Amen. The band's going to come back up.
One of the things we do regularly as a Church family is we take communion together. And communion helps center us in where we are in history. It helps ground us in where we are in human history. helps ground us in where we are in the story as we follow the Lord. Communion is for Christians, those who have placed their faith in Jesus.
So if you are not a Christian, this is not for you. If you have not trusted in Christ, we would call you to believe in him, to be baptized, to to join following him. But this morning, we would ask you not to take communion. Communion is where Jesus, the Lord's table, the night before he is to suffer, he says, "This is my body. that's broken for you.
This is my blood that's shed for the forgiveness of sins. He says, "Take all of you." And he's talking to his disciples and he says, "Do this in remembrance of me." And Paul says that when we practice communion, we proclaim his death until he comes. We ground ourselves where we are in history, which is that he has died. He has risen. His sacrifice covers us.
And we long for the day that he returns. and we get the full extent of the glory of Christ. If you belong to Jesus, take a moment to consider yourself to walk in repentance, to consider his broken body, his shed blood, to not just do this as a as a ritual that you forget what it's about. There's a reason why it's tangible. There's a reason why at times when I'm dipped this and I'm walking back, you see people walking around our Church family with their hands like this as they've taken the the bread and dipped it and it's dripping down their fingers and it's a tangible reminder that he really died.
He really came. He really rose and it really has been accomplished for all who believe and that he will not put to shame any who come to him. And so you get a tangible reminder this morning of the victory that has been won. And we proclaim his death until he comes when all things are set right. So as the band plays and as you're ready, come take communion.
There's gluten-free communion in the back over here.
1 Samuel 16
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Morning. Happy Father's Day to all my fellow dads. Yeah, I get to add that last part now because you know I'm a veteran two and a halfmonth old dad. So, I just got it figured out.
Uh but so, uh if this is your first time with us this morning, we're glad you're here. My name is Isaac. I'm one of the pastors here. And we have been working our way through the book of 1 Samuel. And to be honest with you, as of late, the story has kind of been a bit of a downer.
Uh but today things are getting exciting. And in the middle of this excitement, we see that the spirit of God is at work to accomplish his will. So let's pray and we're going to jump into the story. Father, we thank you very much for this time, this opportunity where we get to gather together as your people to make much of your name. We get to open up your word and we get to hear your truth.
So would your spirit be speaking to us the truth that you would have for us in Jesus name. Amen. So the specific place that we left off last week is that God rejects Saul as king over the people. And he sends Samuel to deliver that message. And unsurprisingly, it's a bit of a confrontation.
There's some tension between Samuel and Saul. And what we saw at the end of the chapter is that Samuel and Saul go their own ways. And this is where we pick up in the story in chapter 16 verse one. And I'll be honest with you, there's a lot in this passage that we could talk about. There's a lot of rabbit trails.
I'm going to do my best to stay on topic, but we're going to be moving quick. So, here we jump in in chapter 16, verse one. The Lord said to Samuel, "How long will you grieve over Saul since I have rejected him from being king over Israel?" So it appears that the Lord here has given Samuel some space to grieve over what would have been as devastating reality for Samuel. He would have been putting in a lot of effort and energy and care into Saul who inevitably we see this downfall in him and it's heartbreaking to Samuel and what kindness the Lord shows uh to Samuel to allow him to grieve. as well.
This question is trying to call Samuel on because as we're going to see, the Lord is moving on. The Lord is the one who rejected Saul and he's moving forward with his plan. Let's continue. So he says to Samuel, "Fill your horn with oil and go. I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I provided for myself a king among his sons." So God tells Samuel that he's got a plan.
And this plan, oh, it's a brilliant plan. It's a genius plan as we're going to see today and in the coming chapters of First Samuel. And it starts by God sending Samuel to this little town Bethlehem. Now, Bethlehem at this time, it's not a town of great renown.
It's just a little place, maybe not even on a map. Of course, you and I. I mean, we even recognize this name today. Every Christmas, you're familiar with the tune, oh little town of Bethlehem. No.
Anybody? No. Some maybe. I don't know. I don't think Pentatonics has picked that up on their Christmas album yet.
But anyways, so Samuel is sent to this little town of Bethlehem. And this is a common theme for the Lord at work to take what is insignificant and use it in his mission. And Samuel responds to the Lord in verse two. And Samuel said, "How can I go?
If Saul hears it, he will kill me." So we saw this tension last week that remains here between Samuel and Saul. And more so than that, what the Lord just asked Samuel to do is in essence participate in a coup. He's asked him to be involved in the overthrowing of the existing king on the throne. This is dangerous stuff. And Samuel knows it.
So he's saying, "How can I go do this?" But the Lord responds to him. Continue on verse two. And the Lord said, "Take a heer with you and say, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord and invite Jesse to the sacrifice and I will show you what you shall do and you shall anoint for me him who I declare to you." So the Lord understands the difficulty that Samuel is in. And he responds to him by saying, "Look, I haven't asked you to go to the rooftops and declare what you're doing. You just get to go and do your normal everyday stuff.
Go to Bethlehem, take an offering. This is what you usually do. Nobody's going to be taken by surprise that that you're going to show up to make a sacrifice." And uh so Samuel is responding to this. And this for me is the beginning of this genius, this creativity of the Lord on display to allow Samuel an opportunity to get in and accomplish this purpose. So continue on verse four.
Samuel did what the Lord commanded and came to Bethlehem. The elders of the city came to meet him trembling and said, "Do you come peaceably?" And he said, "Peaceably, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord. Consecrate yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice." and he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice. So Samuel accepts the plan that the Lord gives him and he goes to Bethlehem and the Lord said, "You're going to find among Jesse, among his sons, the one whom I have chosen." And so when Samuel shows up, the elders greet him.
And apparently they're terrified that Samuel shows up. Now, in this text, it doesn't tell us why they're afraid, but I would venture to guess that it's related to the last time we saw Samuel. It says that he hacked a guy to pieces. And that's the exact language that showed up in the text in 15. Now, maybe the elders didn't witness that, but I don't know about you, but if I had heard about a guy who hacks other guys to pieces, if he came walking into the room, I'd be on the edge of my seat.
So, they're on the edge of their seats. They're concerned that do you come in peace? And Samuel says, 'Yes, I come in peace.' He's sticking to the plan. I've come to make an offering to the Lord. And he's making sure he says,"I want Jesse to be there.
I want Jesse and his sons to be there." So, this is what happens. They're all starting to to get ready for this offering. This word uh consecrate means that they're preparing themselves for the offering. It would involve washing themselves, making themselves clean uh to come and participate in this sacrifice. And they're ready to join Samuel.
And uh as a quick note for context here, what makes the most sense is that the type of offering that Samuel has come to make would be a peace offering or a fellowship offering. And what that would look like uh in short would be that they would take part of the animal and sacrifice it for the Lord. And then the rest of it they would cook and eat among themselves as a sign of peace and fellowship with one another and with God. So that's what Samuel has come to do. They're starting to get ready to participate in this together.
Verse six, when they came, he looked on Eliab and thought, "Surely the Lord's anointed is before him." So when Jesse and his son show up and Samuel's getting ready for this offering, Jesse uh Samuel sees Jesse's oldest son, Eliab, and he thinks that's got to be the one. Apparently Eliab looked like the stuff that kings are made out of. Now, we don't get a whole lot of description of him as we'll see in a second. It appears that he's tall. He's handsome.
Uh but I don't know. I don't know if he, you know, was built well. I don't know if he had a nice chiseled jaw, slick back hair. I think mullets have made their way back in. I don't know if that was a thing back in the day.
Whatever he looked like. I mean, when Samuel saw him, he was like, "Man, the Lord knows how to pick them." But verse seven, but the Lord said to Samuel, "Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart." So this is the difference between man's choosing and God's choosing. Both are making here an evaluation of this man Eliab.
Both are trying to discern whether or not this man would be fit for the position. Samuel's looking though at the physical, at the temporal aspects of this man trying to judge whether he could be a leader. But what God is looking at and what he is concerned with is what is in his heart. What is at the core of this man?
what's in his inner being. The language that uh was used a couple chapters ago is that God is interested in a man after his own heart. Does this man that God is going to choose to be king care about the things that the Lord cares about? And is that going to show up in the way that he leads and loves people?
So I think on one hand, as a quick aside, we don't have time to post up here for a bunch, but I think we understand this idea. I think when we read this, it doesn't jump off the page as super extraordinary. And I think there are plenty of ways in which it shows up in our life. And for the life of our Church, one of the ways that came to mind is that we have an elder and training process. Uh if you don't know, we have an elder and training process.
So for those that are interested in becoming elders and joining our pastor team here at uh Mil City, there's a process where these men will stay with us through the course of years so that we can evaluate if they're fit to be on the team. Now if we just showed up one day and uh Mike Goal, who is currently in the process of being an elder in training, if we just showed up next Sunday and said, "You know what? We have knited him as an elder because look at his luscious locks. you just you can't resist them. That would be your response.
You would laugh at us and then if you thought we were being serious, you'd start to be concerned that that was the reason because we understand that what matters, especially in the the positions of of leadership, is that it's the heart, it's the character at play here. But even though we do have uh a kind of an understanding of this, uh I think we would do well, and once again, this isn't the main point, so we're not going to be able to post up in here, but you can take this thought and meditate on it later. We would do well to reflect on do we evaluate as men evaluate or do we evaluate as God evaluates? Are we more concerned with the temporary aspects of people or the eternal aspects of people?
I just think that's something that's worth our time to consider and meditate and reflect on in our own hearts. But what's going on here is that Samuel sees Eliab and he thinks based on the way he looks that he's going to be a good king. But God says, "No, I haven't chosen him. I'm looking for a man that's after my own heart." So let's continue on.
Verse eight. Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel, and he said,"Neither has the Lord chosen this one." Then Jesse made Shama pass by, and he said, "Neither has the Lord chosen this one." And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel. And Samuel said to Jesse, "The Lord has not chosen these." Now, in this passage, it never directly says that Samuel tells Jesse what's going on. Unlike in Saul, whenever Saul's anointed, Samuel directly says, "I'm anointing you as prince over the people." He doesn't say exactly what's going on, but it's clear that he's choosing. And Jesse here is parading essentially his children, his sons in front of Samuel so that they can be evaluated.
And one goes by, no. Another goes by, no. Another goes by, no. Seven of his sons come by and none of them are chosen. And that leaves us with a question.
at least at least more importantly leaves Samuel with a question because God told him he was going to go to Bethlehem to the house of Jesse and one of his sons was going to be chosen. So this is what he says. Then Samuel said to Jesse verse 11, "Are all your sons here?" And he said, "There remains yet the youngest, but behold, he is keeping the sheep." So apparently David, the youngest one, gets forgotten out taking care of the sheep. I I mean, in fairness to him, there's a lot of kids. There's seven sons before him.
He's the eighth. There's some daughters. There's a lot. It's Father's Day. We'll give him pass.
He says, "Yeah, there's there's the youngest one. He's out taking care of the sheep." And Samuel said to Jesse, "Send and get him, for we will not sit down till he comes here." So Samuel tells Jesse, "Go get the youngest one that's out in the field. We're not going to sit down." Or, in other words, we're not going to participate in this offering, this thing that I have come here to do until you go and get the youngest out in the field. Verse 12. And he sent and brought him in.
Now he was ready and had beautiful eyes and was handsome. And the Lord said, "Arise, anoint him, for this is he." Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. And the spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Rama. So finally, the one that the Lord had chosen appears.
He shows up. And when David walks onto the scene, the Lord tells Samuel, "This is the one that I have chosen. Anoint him." Now, briefly, if I'm honest, I'm a little confused about the description of David because we just read a verse that said, "The Lord doesn't look on the outward appearance." And then we get an outward appearance description of David. Very quickly, what I've come to think and meditate on this is that number one, the description of David is not actually directly tied to the choosing of him. He just shows up and we get a description.
And I think that one of the big reasons why we get a description of what he looks like is, I don't know if you know this, David's basically going to become the main character of the story at this point. He's going to show up a lot. And now you and I kind of know a little bit what he looks like. He's ready. That would mean that he has reddish skin tone.
So, you can picture that as you will. And he's got beautiful eyes and he's handsome. And at this time, he's probably pretty young. We don't know exactly, maybe late teens, mid late teens. We don't know exactly, but he's this young, handsome, beautiful boy.
And he comes walking in and the Lord says, "This is the one that I have chosen." And Samuel anoints him as king. And this anointing that he does, it's this clear marker that he's being set apart for God's work. That's what anointing was for. So David here is being set apart for the work that God has for him. And when he's anointed, it says that the spirit of the Lord rushed upon him from that day forward.
God's personal presence comes to dwell upon David in a way that he hadn't known to empower and equip him for the work that the Lord had for him. And it's going this strenuous road ahead that David has to walk as we'll see in the chapters to come. And it says here that it was from that day forward. So it gives us a hint into surely this is going to look different than Saul. David's going to look different than Saul as king.
So we see that David here is anointed by God as king of the people. What an amazing event. But there's a king of the people. What about Saul?
We understand that God has rejected him from king over the people. I don't think the people have rejected him yet. As a matter of fact, I think the people probably like him fairly well. Militaristically speaking, Saul's done. I He's got a good record.
He's defeated enemies. He's kept them safe. And if he really kept up his peopleleasing acts, I guess some people are satisfied with Saul as king. So, I can imagine that it probably wouldn't go very well if Samuel just walted up with David and said, "Behold, message from the Lord.
Saul, you're not king anymore. This young pretty boy David, he's your king now." I I don't think people would buy it. Now, if God really said to do that, they should, but come on, we know how people work. So God needs a way to shift the masses of people to understand the direction that he is going with the anointing of David. And that's what we're going to see taking place in the rest of the book of First Samuel.
And right now we get to look at the first step of this master plan of the Lord to get David onto the throne. Because David one day will be on the throne. He's not. He goes back to sheep today, but he will be on the throne. The Lord has anointed him.
The spirit of the Lord has rushed upon him. And this sp the spirit, this mention of the spirit, it's the the link between the end of Saul's reign and the beginning of David's, as we'll see here in verse 14. So, let's continue on. Now the spirit of the Lord departed from Saul and a harmful spirit from the Lord tormented him. Now that's intense.
And not only is it intense, it also raises some questions. So we see that the spirit of the Lord rushes upon David. The spirit of the Lord departs from Saul and then a harmful spirit from the Lord torments him. Now, I think there are two primary questions that are worth asking before we continue on in this story.
The first being, if the spirit of the Lord left Saul, will he leave me? Now, that question, if you have that question in your head and that causes you to get held up before we move on, pause that at the end. We're going to come back. That's where we're going to spend most of our time at the end of this. So, we're not skirting the question.
We're just getting to it later. Second question that I think we ask is, are there harmful spirits that the Lord uses to torment people? Is that a thing? What's going on here?
Now, what I want to do is I want to offer two interpretive options to understand what is going on here. I'll tell you the one that I lean toward and then I'll also tell you I don't think however you interpret this actually matters to the difficulty we have in asking the question. So here's a couple interpretive options. Interpretive option number one that what's being described here as a harmful spirit that is tormenting Saul is that it is an evil spirit or in other words a spiritual being that is against the will of God that God allows to torment Saul by removing his protection from him. So you would come to that understanding probably from seeing that it says that the spirit of the Lord departed from Saul.
So surely that involves removing some of his protection from Saul and what's going on and that uh we don't see it in the ESV translation but some translations are going to uh say that it's an evil spirit not a harmful spirit. So that would be another way that you would come to that understanding is that this is a spiritual being against the will of God who comes in cause uh harm and uh torment Saul because God's protection has left. That's option number one. option number two that exists and this is the one that I lean towards. This is a spirit who submits to the will of God.
This is a spiritual being who submits to the will of God. And it is inside of God's will that harm would befall Saul. Last week, the last two weeks, we saw the disobedience of Saul on display and we saw the judgment of the Lord coming upon him because of it. So, we've already gotten to wrestle with some of this.
And that I think is actually at the core of the question that when we are concerned with what's going on here, we're primarily concerned with that God would be directly involved in harm befalling someone. And so, no matter how you interpret this, that's at play. And luckily for me in our time this morning, two weeks ago, Spencer spent a whole sermon just talking about God's wrath and judgment. And so if you get hung up on that question and you weren't here two weeks ago, I would encourage you as you continue to wrestle with this, go back and listen to that sermon.
You can find it on our website or on our YouTube page. And also, as a quick aside, all of our sermons are recorded. So, if you're looking for a database of all good information on the Bible, you can go to our uh website or our YouTube page and see all sorts of stuff. But if this question just you wrestle with it and it's difficult, my encouragement would be go back, listen to it. But unfortunately, for time sake, that's all we have to be able to discuss today.
But what's going on here is that the spirit of the Lord rushes upon David. The spirit of the Lord departs from Saul. Saul's been rejected as the one who's going to reign as king ultimately because call Saul has rejected God. And then there's this harmful spirit that comes upon Saul. And this is this is directly related to the plan.
This is directly related to the genius that is taking place as we're going to see to get David to the throne. So let's continue on. Verse 15. And Saul's servants said to him, "Behold now, a harmful spirit from God is tormenting you.
Let our Lord now command your servants who are before you to seek out a man who is skillful in playing the liar. And when the harmful spirit from God is upon you, he will play it and you will be well." So somehow Saul's servants know exactly what's going on. And more than that, they know that playing a liar, playing a stringed instrument is the exact fix that Saul needs for his problem. Whatever the way is that they know this, this is directly linked to God's plan of working to get David onto the throne, as we'll see. Verse 17.
So Saul said to his servants, "Provide for me a man who can play well, and bring him to me." One of the young men answered, "Behold, I have seen a son of Jesse the Bethleamite, who is skillful in playing, a man of valor, a man of war, prudent in speech, and a man of good presence, and the Lord is with him. Therefore, Saul sent his messengers to Jesse and said, "Send me David, your son, who is with the sheep." So, Saul likes the idea. Maybe he didn't have other options. He thinks, "That's a good one. I'll pursue that one." He says, "Go find me someone who can play." Lo and behold, one of the servants says, "I've heard a young guy happens to be David from Jesse.
He's great at playing the liar." And more than that, David's really getting talked up. I mean, he's brave. He's seen combat. He's a guy that's careful with his word. He's just got a good presence to him.
You know, he's got good vibes. The Lord is with him. These are good attributes. As we'll see, these characters, this character of David is going to be on display for us in the rest of Samuel as it plays out. But Saul, he really likes this idea.
And so, he sends to go get David and bring him in. Verse 20. And Jesse took a donkey laden with bread and a skin of wine and a young goat and sent them by David his son to Saul. And David came to Saul and entered his service. And Saul loved him greatly, and he became his armor bearer.
And Saul sent to Jesse, saying, "Let David remain in my service, for he has found favor in my sight." And whenever the harmful spirit from God was upon Saul, David took the liar and played it with his hand. So Saul was refreshed and was well and the harmful spirit departed from him. So Saul likes a plan. He sends to get David. David comes to be in Saul's service and the plan it works.
David plays the liar and it soothes Saul. Just imagine heart on the doulamer playing it. It's just beautiful melody that's coming out that just soothes you. That's what's happening here that Saul it works. the plan is working.
And not only that, Saul really likes David. Like, he really likes David. I mean, he even makes him his armor bearer. We saw a couple weeks ago Jonathan and his armor bearer when they went handinand into combat to defeat a Philistine garrison. The amount of trust that you have to have to make someone your armor bearer, to be the one that would fight alongside you, to be the one that would tend to that which protects you in war.
Man, Saul really likes what was this nobody little boy from this nobody town who's come to be with the king. David is now on the inside. David has inched closer and closer to the throne because of this masterful maneuvering of the Lord and this dicey political situation. David has been anointed as king. God has chosen him.
He has poured his spirit out upon David. I told you we'd come back to this idea of the spirit here because in this story it is the central connecting point between what we see happening with Saul and what's happening with David in that question that we asked earlier it's been left lingering which is if the spirit of God leaves Saul will it leave me now to answer this I think we have to have an understanding of what God is doing in the bigger narrative of the different covenantal periods or another way of saying that is through the different testaments. So in your Bible you have Old Testament, you have New Testament. There's a central figure as we'll see here that marks the difference. Now today our story is taking place in the Old Testament.
The narrative, the big narrative of the Old Testament is that there's going to be a promised one who would come to bring about redemption. That is the big picture of the Old Testament. That there is a promised one who will come, who will bring about redemption, who would bring about God's rule and reign here on earth. Saul was a king. Saul was king of God's people.
He was supposed to in part bring God's rule and reign, but he failed. He couldn't. David, as we'll see, he's renowned as the greatest king that Israel has ever known. He's seen as a man after God's own heart. I hate to spoil it for you if you don't know, but David fails.
We need something. We need someone better that can accomplish what God desires and coming to be and to dwell among his people. The Old Testament is screaming that out that we need someone to do this work. And the one who accomplishes that work shows up on the front pages of the New Testament. And his name is Jesus.
Jesus comes to be the better David. Jesus comes to be the better king, the one who is going to usher in the rule and the reign of God among his people in the way that he desires. And the message of Jesus is that he is God himself come to be among people like you and I so that he could rescue and save us by going to the cross by atoning for the sins of the world. In the Gospel of John, there's a popular set of chapters called the Upper Room Discourse. It's right at the end of Jesus's earthly ministry.
And he's it's this very intimate setting between him and his disciples. And what he says to them is,"I am going to have to leave so that I can accomplish my work because if I go and accomplish my work, I get to send to you the helper. I get to send to you the spirit, my spirit." that Jesus if he goes to suffer and die at the cross to atone for the sins of the world so that he can rise from the dead in resurrection power and ascend to the throne. If he can do that then he can send his spirit his helper to be among his people and that is where you and I live. We live in the finished work of Jesus.
He did go and accomplish that work and he did send his spirit to be in his people. So we come back to the question, if the spirit left Saul, will he leave me? Well, as we just saw, we're living in the finished work of Jesus. So my response to that question would be rooted in what Paul says in Ephesians 1. Ephesians 1:13, "In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the Gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it." This is language of finality.
We are sealed. The spirit is our guarantee. Guarantee is not a maybe. Guarantee isn't a if you can do well enough. Guarantee is final.
The spirit of the almighty creator. If you belong to Christ, he dwells in you. Just think about that for a second. You and I, the spirit of the living God, the very essence of who he is, dwells within you and I. What amazing love and grace that the father has for us that as sons and daughters he would give himself to us.
One of the beautiful things about the spirit that I want to focus on for the rest of our time here is that the spirit doesn't just show up at the beginning of your relationship with Christ and then show up at the end to give you your inheritance. It's not just a beginning and end thing. The spirit of God is in you in the everyday. He's with you when you rose this morning and when you brushed your teeth and when you came in and got coffee. As we sit here now, the spirit of God dwells within us.
He's in the everyday stuff of life. And surely that means something. Surely that shows up in some kind of way if the essence of our creator is within us in the everyday. So what I want to do is now we could spend a lot of time talking about all sorts of ways in which the spirit shows up in our everyday life, but what I want to do is just look at in the rest of Ephesians, Paul mentions several places how the spirit is at work in the life of a believer. So we're just going to go through there are five different ones that I want to point out this morning that Paul pointed out to the Church in Ephesus about the spirit that could be at work in them.
So, number one that we're going to look at, the spirit reveals. The spirit of God reveals. In Ephesians chapter 1, just a couple verses later from what we just read, Paul says this. I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of Revelation in the knowledge of him. that Paul says, "My prayer is that the spirit will be revealing in you the knowledge of Christ." Do you know that your knowledge of Christ has come to you by the Revelation of the spirit of God at work in your life?
I can remember when this first began to be real for me in the most potent, powerful way. freshman year of college, the pages of Scripture coming alive, the spirit beginning to actually reveal to me this man, Jesus, and who he is and what he's done. It's not always that potent in life. Sometimes you just have a day. But do you know that what you know about Jesus is revealed to you because of the spirit of God?
Shouldn't we long for the spirit of God to reveal to us the mysteries of Christ? Because I don't know if you know this, that's the news that has changed our world. That's the news that has changed your world. Don't we want to know him more?
That's the work of the spirit in our life. So the spirit reveals. Second thing, the spirit unifies. The spirit unifies. In Ephesians chapter 2, Paul says this, for through him, that's Christ, we both have access in one spirit to the father.
So then, you no longer you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. There is one spirit that binds us in unity. Now maybe if you see our cultural moment, you see any of the Church, you might have a question. Really?
Does he really do that? One of the things that I was thinking about reflecting on was even in all the attempts of the spiritual forces of darkness and the ignorance of man, the Church is still here. Yes, we have muddied things up, but the spirit has been at work in God's people to bring about unity. What a beautiful thing. I don't know about you, but I might not know any of you if it weren't for the work of the spirit.
We surely wouldn't be in this room all sitting peaceibly together. We have something that is transcendent within us that binds us together. May we long that the spirit would bring us unity and cast out any opportunity for gossip, any opportunity for relational hurt that would keep us from being able to be at peace. The spirit unifies. Third thing, the spirit equips.
Paul in Ephesians 4 says this. There is one body and one spirit. Just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift. And then he goes on to talk about gifts that he has given to the Church, members in the Church for the building up of the body of Christ.
The spirit of God dwells within us, equipping us, equipping you and I. The spirit of the living God lives within each one of us and you and I so that you and I can build one another up. What a beautiful and amazing thing. One of my great joys in life is being able to help others with building things and fixing things. And thank you, Phoebe.
And what I've come to understand is that that's a gift. as a gift the Spirit's given me to help build other people up. And I pray that he continues to allow me to use that gift for the building up of one another. I don't know how the spirit of God has equipped you. We'll get to talk in our community groups this week about that.
But in whatever way he has equipped you, it's for the purpose of building us up. If you look in the room, there are other people. It's for the building up of us in this room here. Ultimately, he says, so that we can attain to the unity of the faith. Comes back to this unified aspect.
They're all intermingled. It's one spirit. You can't really easily parse them all out. But the spirit equips. The spirit equips.
One last thing I want to say on this real quick. I got to move quick here. A lot of times I think we can think in a Church context that uh people like me, people like the ones who play instruments or watch kids, that's it. That's the extent of the service that we can give to each other and it's limited to what happens on a Sunday morning. That's not it's just like a tiny little sliver of what happens.
And what I love about our community groups is that you get to actually be connected to one another in life and that those are the places where the spirit really gets to move to build one another up because you're actually intimately connected to know what is the way in which I need to build this person up. So, just as a quick aside, if you feel like, man, I don't I can't speak in front of people, I can't play an instrument, I can't do this, I can't do that. It doesn't have to show up in the way that we do stuff here on Sunday, but the spirit does equip you to work in the life of our brothers and sisters who are here in this room in the everyday. Number four, the spirit convicts. Ephesians 6, Paul has a fairly popular passage uh about the armor of God.
Here's what he says. Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God. And he gives a list of different things. And one of them is this.
The sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. Now, you take this understanding with Hebrews chapter 4. The word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing through the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and marrow, discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. The spirit of God reveals in us the part of us that is weak, the part of us that is broken and hurting, the part of us that is bent away from the things of God. last week uh the other night uh was you know as I said at the beginning my wife and I we've got a newborn son and it's been a wonderful journey uh and we were setting him down at night.
Honestly, he's been doing great at night. It's wonderful that he sleeps longer. Uh but for some reason after I set him down I was going to bed like my mind just wouldn't turn off and I was awake and I was just frustrated. Why won't you just shut off so you can go to sleep?
He's asleep. just shut off so she can go to sleep. So, I'm getting angsty and then he starts crying. I'm getting I'm I'm frustrated. I'm tired.
I'm getting up. He's crying. He needs a diaper change. I'm putting him on the table. I'm trying to change his diaper.
He's crying. He's flanneling about. That's the most aggravating thing. It's like, I'm trying to help you, kid. Just stop moving your legs.
I'm trying to change him. My My anger my anger just starts to get the best of me. My wife comes in because, you know, maybe there's a ruckus at this point in the room. And in her in her grace and wisdom, she's trying to help. She's trying to say, "Ah, you should you should maybe step away.
I'll take this one." And I'm, you know, I just obviously handle that so well. Just such peace and gentleness. No. So, she does take them and in her love, she handles it way better than I.
And I go back to the bed. It takes me a little while longer, but eventually I fall asleep. I wake up the next morning. I'm just feeling this sense of conviction. I'm having to pray before my father, please forgive me.
I have to later that day when I see my wife. I'm sorry. The anger got the best of me. one day because I'm sure it won't be the last. I'll have to tell my son I'm sorry.
That's the work of the spirit within me to reveal that and then empower me to live in the truth of Jesus that I am forgiven. May we be like David in Psalm 139. 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.
Father, would you in your spirit reveal in us the ways in which we're grieving you? But then would you lead us in the way everlasting? Would you remind us? Would you reveal to us again the truth of Jesus, the love and forgiveness he has for us?
The spirit convicts. Lastly, the spirit sins. Right after this verse in Ephesians 6, talking about the armor of God, this is what Paul says. Praying at all times in the spirit with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints and also for me that words may be given to me and opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the Gospel.
Paul says, "Be in prayer always." And in that prayer, remember me that the spirit might equip me with the words to say to proclaim the mystery of Christ. The Church in Ephesus alone wouldn't have been there if the spirit had not sent Paul to proclaim the mystery of Christ. Mil City Church wouldn't be here if the spirit had not sent men to proclaim the message of Christ. And one thing I am being more and more convicted of and convinced of is that I am sent here. This isn't happen stance.
It's not coincidence that you find me here in this area. The spirit has sent me. Do you know that it's not a coincidence that you're here in this chair? The spirit has sent you wherever you are. in your home, at your work, in your neighborhood, with your family, your friends, wherever it is the spirit has sent you.
May our prayer be that of Paul's that the spirit would equip us to speak boldly of Christ. The spirit sins. What gift the father has given us that he would allow his personal powerful presence to dwell within you and I. What I want to do with the rest of our time, maybe you noticed earlier that we didn't have a time of prayer. It's been shifted to now.
In Ephesians chapter 3, the same book, this is what Paul says. For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his spirit in your inner being. Paul longs for. He gets down on his knees before the father, praying that the Church in Ephesus would be filled with the power of spirit in their inner being to accomplish that which God has called them to. So what we're going to do right now as a Church is we're going to pray.
We're going to pray through each of these things that we just talked about that the spirit of God would be working in us in our inner being to reveal, to unify, to equip, to convict, and to send us. So, the way it'll work is I will say a quick prayer uh for each bullet point to start off that section. And so I'll pray that the spirit would reveal and that'll uh open up a time for all of us to pray together and then I'll say a short prayer about the spirit unifying and so forth and so on. That's what we're going to do with the rest of our time and then the band will come back up and we'll sing. Let me pray.
Almighty Father, what grace that you have given us that the very essence of who you are in your spirit would come to dwell within lowly people like us. And Father, we pray that you would be revealing the truth of Jesus in our life wherever we are at right now. Father, it's all too easy for us to be at odds with one another. Father, would you give us your spirit that unifies Father, you have equipped us and you will equip us as you see fit in your spirit to accomplish your desires in this Church. Would you make it known to us the ways in which you have equipped us for the building up of one another?
Father, you know our hearts. You know how we're twisted. Would you in your spirit and in your kindness reveal to us the ways in which we need to repent, turn to you, and give us the strength in your spirit to do so? Father, you have sent us. You've sent us into this community of the greater Colombia area to be ambassadors to be ministers of the Gospel to be those who would be empowered by your spirit like Paul to boldly proclaim the message of Jesus.
For this reason we bow our knees before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named that according to the riches of his glory he may grant us to be strengthened with power through his spirit in our inner being. So that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith. That us being rooted and grounded in love may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge that we may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think according to the power at work within us. To him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever.
Amen. The band's going to come up. We're going to sing we're going to sing a song called Your Will Be Done. And that's at the core of this desire that the spirit would be at work with in us. That it would not be our wills that we would be seeking to accomplish, but it would be the spirit of God and work within us to reveal to us his will and what he's doing.
So, let's sing together as a Church.
1 Samuel 15 (part 2)
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 in week two of 1st Samuel 15.
So, we were originally going to I was going to approach this all in one clip and then after looking at it, we realized that uh we'll see in a few moments in kind of beginning in verse three and four is a very visible display of the wrath of God. And uh in our western culture, we're not the best prepped to be able to receive that uh even though that's not the main point of the text. So last week, we spent some time uh looking at that uh this passage in light of uh the wrath of God as an essential part of God's character that flows from Genesis into the New Testament. So if you weren't here, I encourage you uh you can go back and listen to that. But we're going to look at what is actually the main point of this week.
It is Saul's disobedience that leads to his rejection of his kingship. So, we're going to walk through this today and we're going to see that one of the biggest reasons for Saul's failure here, but also elsewhere is that Saul simply just doesn't know God. He doesn't know God. And what flows out of that is disobedience. And we're going to look at three different aspects of his disobedience after we walk through this story that kind of give us three warnings and three lessons for us as the Church to see the importance of both knowing God and not falling into some of the same traps that he fell into.
So I'm going to pray and then we're going to walk through this together. Heavenly Father, I pray that you might help us have hearts to receive your word. God, I pray that we would not just be hearers of the word, but we be doers of the word. We respond in faith and repentance and in worship and in delighting in you above all things. We ask this in Jesus name.
Amen. All right. So, we're going to start off in verse one. And Samuel said to Saul, "The Lord sent me to anoint you king over his people Israel." Now, therefore, listen to the words of the Lord.
Thus says the Lord of hosts, I have noted what Amalecch did to Israel and opposing them on the way when they came up out of Egypt. Now go and strike Amalecch and devote to destruction all they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey, which pause, that's what we spent all of last weekend is trying to understand that right there in light of the rest of the Scriptures. So, if you're new here or you weren't here last week and you're encounting that for the first time, I would encourage you go back and listen to last week as we sat in that idea as an aspect of God's character, his wrath.
But we're going to move on. Verse four. So Saul summoned the people and numbered them in to 200,000 men on foot and 10,000 men of Judah. And Saul came to the city of Amalecch and lay in wait in the valley. Then Saul said to the Kennites, "Go depart.
Go down from there. go down from among the Amalachites, lest I destroy you with them. For you showed kindness to all the people of Israel when they came up out of Egypt. So the Kennites departed from among the Amalachites, which this, as you remember last week, God's judgment is on the Amalachites. The Amalachites were the ones who opposed the people of God, sought to exterminate them, sought to war against them in the book of Exodus.
The Kennites are actually a people that were good towards God and his people. So the judgment is for the Amalachites. The Kennites leave. And then verse seven, and Saul defeated the Amalachites from Havala as far as sure, which is east of Egypt. And he took Aag, the king of the Amalachites alive, and do devoted to destruction all the people with the edge of the sword.
But Saul and the people spared Aag and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, of the fattened calves, and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them. All that was despised and worthless, they devoted to destruction. So they devote to destruction, the Amalachites, men, women, they they they they fulfill part of it, but then Saul leads the people and decides Aag will be spared and the best of their livestock. So he disobys the Lord. And when you look at all the destruction that happened that he doesn't follow through with the rest of this, it's like why?
What's happening here? And this greatly displeases the Lord. Verse 10, the word of the Lord came to Samuel. I regret that I have made Saul king, for he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments. And Samuel was angry and he cried to the Lord all night.
So God judges Saul. So I regret that I made him king. He's not performed my commandments. And Samuel's angry. He's upset.
He cries to the Lord all night because this is difficult. Samuel loves Saul. Loves him. Has a heart for him. And if you've ever invested in someone, if you ever given your life away to someone that you've loved and you spent time with and you and you gave your energy to and you help them, point them to God and they you show them what it looks like to follow God, what it looks like to love God, what it looks like to know God, what it looks like to obey his commands, and then they reject that and self-destruct.
I mean, it is painful to see people that you love do this. And Samuel feels that through the night as he's crying out to the Lord. Verse 12, Samuel rose early to meet Saul in the morning. So he wakes up and it was told Samuel, Saul came to Carmel and behold, he set up a monument for himself and turned and passed on and went down to Gil. So, not only is Samuel receiving the reality that Saul has disobeyed the Lord, he's been rejected.
He hears of there's a monument that Saul has set up to his own greatness. He doesn't he's blind. He doesn't even see this is to his own re disobedience, to his own rebellion against the will of God that he's making monuments to his own sin and he can't see it. Verse 13. And Samuel came to Saul, and Saul said to him, "Blessed be you to the Lord.
I have performed the commandment of the Lord." And listen, the rest of this just reads very much like Saul is a thoughtless child. Like he he doesn't get it. He's like, "Look," sometimes I tell my kids, "Yeah, clean up clean up your room. Go in." Like, "Look, I've cleaned it. It's great.
And there's candy wrappers, which that's a problem. You're not supposed to have candy in your room. Now, I got to address that. Also, there's toys everywhere.
Completely blind, but they've not done what they're supposed to do. And Sam, he g Saul says, "Look, Samuel, I've done it. I performed the commandment of God." Saul is quickly confronted with reality. Vers 14. And Samuel said, "What then is this bleeding of the sheep in my ears and the loing of the oxen that I hear?" It's like, "What?
What then? What is the candy wrappers and the toys in the ground? What why do I hear the bleeding of sheep? Why do I hear the loing of of oxen?
If you've performed the commandment of God, then what is that sound, Saul?" He's quick with an explanation. Verse 15, Saul said, "They have brought them from the Amalachites, for the people spared the best of the sheep and of the oxen to sacrifice to the Lord your God, and the rest we have devoted to destruction." So, in true childlike fashion, quick with an explanation, let's go. Now, we we we saved these for the Lord. That what happened was is that we that's what we did. We saved these for the Lord.
See, this is a good thing that we've done, Samuel. And Samuel in true father-like fashion is like, I'm done with this. I'm I'm I'm I'm done with this fixing. Then Samuel said to Saul, "Stop. I will tell you what the Lord said to me this night." And he said to him, "Speak." And Samuel said, "Though you are little in your own eyes, are you not the head of the tribes of Israel?
The Lord anointed you king over Israel. The Lord sent you on a mission and said, "Go devote to destruction the sinners, the Amalachites, and fight against them until they are consumed." It's like, "Though you, Saul, are small in your own eyes, being from the tribe of Benjamin, the smallest of the tribes. You are chosen as the king. You were chosen as the one who has authority to lead the people in obeying my voice." It was you that was chosen, raised up for this moment to finally bring judgment on the enemy of the people, the Amalachites. It was you.
Verse 19, why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you pounce on the spoil and do what was evil in the sight of the Lord? which had to be the question that sat on Samuel's soul all night is why why did you do it? Why did you disobey God?
Why did you pounce on the spool? Why? It's because Saul can't see that God has a bigger plan here to bring judgmental. He can't see it. He hears this.
He interprets how he should do it. Does what he wants. And still he's defending himself. Verse 20 it says, "And Saul said to Samuel, I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. I have gone on mission on which the Lord sent me.
I have brought Aag, the king of Amalecch, and I have devoted the Amalachites to destruction." But the people took of the spoil sheep and oxen, the best of the things devoted to destruction, sacrificed to the Lord your God in Gilgal, which is a bit of blame shifting there. Now he's moved the goalpost a little bit. So uh no it was but but the people did but but even even the people did that. It's still a good thing. You know we we obeyed the voice of the Lord and this this livestock.
It's it's going to be set up for the Lord. It's going to be for a good reason. I will we will honor the Lord with sacrifices. And it's clear as you read this, like again, Saul just doesn't know God. He doesn't know God.
Doesn't understand the importance of how all this is tied into your history as a people into the law and to the history that goes back to Exodus 17. Like you you don't know God to think that you are going to offer sacrifices and somehow get away. That's not how this works. At this point, Samuel shifts into which is this. What we're about to hear is is the word of the Lord to Saul.
And it's we can't see this in the English, but this little section in Hebrew rhymes. It's poetic in form. It rhymes and it's going to be sticky and remembered by the people of God for centuries. Verse 22. And Samuel said, "Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as and obeying the voice of the Lord?" Meaning that does God you think God cares more about your offerings than obedience than obeying the voice of God?
He says, "Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams." He says it's it's better for you to listen and obey than to think the fat of rams which again this isn't to put down sacrifices. Sacrifices are good. In the book of Levit Leviticus you see this intentional structuring of sacrif the sacrificial system that was meant for the people of God to come and worship to remember what sin costs. The fat of rams was a good thing for the people to worship in. But that was not disconnected from a heart that loved God wholly and knew him and was obedient to his voice and what he commands.
Says for this for rebellion is the sin of divination and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. meaning that this sin is like all the other sins in the sense you you're rebelling against the will of God because you have rejected the word of the Lord. He has also rejected you from being king. And this is the final pronouncement of judgment on Saul and his kingship. It's over.
That what was started in his disobedience and the unlawful sacrifices that we saw a few chapters ago is now finalized here. It's over for you as king. And the thought still lingers. Why?
Why go through this massive battle, all the all the destruction and and you do this? Like what were you thinking, Saul? And then finally in verse 24, we get a glimpse into what he was thinking. We see part of the problem. Verse 24, Saul said to Samuel, "I have sinned, for I have transgressed the commandment of the Lord and your words because I feared the people and obeyed their voice.
Now therefore, please pardon my sin and return with me that I may bow before the Lord. The final reason comes out. Saul fears his own people. Which means that probably when the battle was wrapping up and they were securing victory, the people did what all the armies in ancient near east did. They started grabbing spoils of victory.
started grabbing sheep and oxmen. And in that moment, the people are hungry to celebrate their own victory. And as Saul sees this, he doesn't have the courage to stand in that moment on the convictions to obey the voice of the Lord. They start murmuring about how much they deserve this. And he fears their opinion more.
He fears them more than God. Because in that moment, he could have used his king authority, his kingly authority, and said, "The next man that grabs a sheep will be struck dead along with that sheep. We will obey the voice of the Lord. Everything will be devoted to destruction. He has given us this victory and we will secure this final victory from God." Nobody grabs anything and they're going down with it.
He could have and they'd have step two, but he doesn't because he fears the people over God. And then also this, he spares Ag, which reeks of pride and arrogance because that right there is what the kings of the ancient near east did. When you conquered and defeated a people, you would take their king and they would become your slave. It was a way to parade around your power. Look at all these kings that I've defeated.
Look at all these these nations I've brought blow. It was it was a power flex to his own glory and not to the glory of God. I mean, you see this in in history. You see this in the Scriptures later with the kings of Judah. This is what happens.
And he acts just like the other kings of the ancient near east, making much of his own glory. Which leads me to believe also that some of this is not just ignorance, but he's also, I think, a little bit lying here. That all this was not just, oh, this is for your glory, God. We're going to do sacrifices. That he's just making up excuses like a child who's been caught.
And he wants Samuel, but but do just do this to me. Return with me that I may bow before the Lord. Which also again, it's like you you you still don't understand the you don't can't read the moment. It's like that's a little bit of I I want to look good in front of the tribal leaders. I want to look good still.
It's like you don't understand. Saul 26. And Samuel said to Saul, I I will not return with you, for you have rejected the word of the Lord, and the Lord has rejected you from being king over Israel. As Samuel turned to go away, Saul seized the skirt of his robe and it tore. And Samuel said to him, "The Lord has torn the kingdom of Israel from you this day and has given it to a neighbor of yours who is better than you." Which that in itself is powerful because that action is like a real time parable of what's to come.
Grabs his robe, piece is torn off, and he says, "Yes. The kingdom has been torn from you. It will be given to another, which is how this is going to play out. 29 Also, the glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for he is not a man that he should have regret.
Then he said, I have sinned, yet honor me now before the elders of my people and before Israel, and return with me that I may bow before the Lord your God." And it seems a bit of Samuel's compassion shows up here because he does love Saul. So he concedes on that. So Samuel turned back after Saul and Saul bowed before the Lord. Now Samuel's going to finish the job. That's what we saw last week.
We skipped to this part. Verse 32. Then Samuel said, "Bring here to me Aag, the king of the Amalachites." And Aag came to him cheerfully. Aag said, "Surely the bitterness of death is passed." And Samuel said, "As your sword has made women childless, so shall your mother be childless among women." And Samuel hacked Aag to pieces before the Lord in Gilgal. So he brings the judgment upon as you as you have done all of this evil, Ag, this is being brought upon you.
Hacks him to pieces. Verse 34. And Samuel went to Rama. And Saul went up to his house in Gibia of Saul. And Samuel did not see Saul again until the day of his death.
But Samuel grieved over Saul. And the Lord regret that he made Saul king over Israel. So they part ways and Samuel is grieved. And Saul again displays. He does not know God.
He does not heed his commands. He doesn't have a heart and a zeal for obeying the Lord. And his disobedience becomes his downfall. So what I want to do for the rest of our time is I want to take a closer look at his disobedience as warnings for us. I want to examine three examples of his disobedience that serve as a caution for us as we seek to know God and obey his commandments.
So there are three lessons here starting with this first one. The first is follow when you cannot clearly see why. Follow when you cannot clearly see why. They grieved by Saul's disobedience. Samuel says, "Why?
Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you pounce on the spoil and do what was evil in the sight of the Lord?" And what becomes clear here is that he can't understand why God would call for total destruction. Like he in his ignorance decides, I'm going to hear this command and I'm I'm going to fulfill part of it and just kind of do what I want. I mean, it it really is clear that he's ignorant to their history. He's ignorant to the law that he's supposed to delight in the law of the Lord because the moment that he receives that command to destroy the Amalachites.
I mean, should have remembered the book of Exodus. Should have remembered the book of Deuteronomy. Should have remembered the judgment that God had proclaimed that was going to come on the Amalachites. He should have known. But it's clear he doesn't know God.
And when he receives this command, he does what he wants. And that lesson is incredibly important to us to follow when you cannot clearly see why. Especially if you are new to following Jesus or starting to get serious about your faith and you have not read the rest of the Scriptures and understood many of its teachings. If you don't understand the big picture of faith and then you receive a command and you kind of do what you want with it, it doesn't go well. My son is seven and he's really really gifted.
Uh he's got really an engineering mind in a way that I never did. He got that from his mom. Like he's just really he's really good at at building things and he got this uh this uh STEM gift uh which is a picture of how much my family hates me that they would give my son a STEM gift that I'm going to have to be involved with knowing that I'm not good at this kind of stuff. But they gave him a small engine kit to build a small engine. And it was cool to see him.
I mean, he just jumped in and was like, I mean, just putting it together. I was like, I could never do that at seven. I could barely do that at 36. With my wife's help sometimes, but he's just going for it. And then all of a sudden, he's trying to fit together parts and it's not fitting and it's getting frustrated.
He asked for help. So, we sit down, we disassemble it, and then it's clear. He just said, "Buddy, you you you skipped this step. You didn't do it." In that moment, he just looked at it and said, "Ah, it's not important. I'm going to keep going." And it's like, "That you can't do that, buddy.
You don't know how this works. You don't understand the big picture of how small engines work. You You've got to follow the steps because you don't actually understand this. That's I have to do that all the time. Give me the IKEA set." And it's like I'm one, two, three, four.
I ain't freewill in that. I have freewheel that it's not gone well. And it's like if I if you can't if you don't clearly understand the big picture of why God calls us to obedience, you cannot make it up as you go along. You you can't freew will it. You can't hear a command from God and decide, well, yeah, but I'm just going to obey part of this without understanding these commands are rooted in the Scriptures for a reason in the bigger history of God's people over and over again.
I mean, there there are commands like like flee sexual immorality or or or the the continued command to give to the Lord, give generously to the Lord. Or a third one, the uh uh be slow to speak. All three of those commands show up throughout the Scriptures in different parts. I mean, you can trace through history in different books of the Bible, how important it was for the people of God to heed those commands. But if you receive those and then you just start freewilling it.
Yeah, I know I'm supposed to flee from sexual morality, but like I mean God's a God of grace and I mean he understands like I mean purity is hard and it's like I mean I just just a little. I mean I'll be okay. Like God God's gracious, right? I know I'm supposed to give but right now like I've got a bunch of things I'm trying to do. Like God knows I got I got needs I got to take care of.
So I I just I mean I I'll be generous at some point but right now I've got this stuff to take care of. Not understanding that generosity is it's not about the end. It's not about the means. It's about the end. It's our hearts that we would not worship things but worship God the giver of things.
They might hear yeah I know I'm spo I'm supposed to watch my mouth and stuff but I'm Italian. It's our family. We are expressive people. Doesn't God want me to be my true self?
and we'll rationalize obedience. And that's what Saul did. So, go devote the destruction all that they have. Do not spare them. And he says, "Yeah, but I'll ag that that'll be okay.
You can't do that." We need to know God. We need to know him and understand why he calls us into obedience. But if we have not learned more of who God is and why he commands us to do the things that we do that until we get to that point as we seek to know him, when we see something in the Scriptures that calls us to obedience, we step too. We don't we don't move in the direction that we want. We move in the direction that God wants.
As we seek to know him and understand that in knowing him, I'll fully better be be a be able better to appreciate why he commands me to do this in the first place. Because this type of obedience actually leads to joy. I love what J Packer says about this. He says, "Knowing God is a relationship calculated to thrill a man's heart. And once you understand that in light of also the commands that he gives us that those commands even though difficult at times are meant to thrill our heart in knowing more of God.
So the first is follow when you cannot clearly see why which is something Saul failed to do in obedience. The second is fear God not man. Fear God, not man. So Samuel finally gets to the bottom of it in verse 24 and it says Saul said to Samuel, I have sinned for I transgressed the commandment of the Lord and your words because I feared the people and obeyed their voice. It's like Saul doesn't know God.
He doesn't because he doesn't fear him like you should. Again, he was given God granted authority as king over his people. But the voices of men were loud. They were loud in his heart. And when he heard the voice of men and what they desired, he feared them over the Lord.
He shrunk down and feared what they thought and what they wanted over what the Lord wanted as they began to pick the spo of victory for themselves. And it's like he's not hearing the voice of the Lord and he's not fearing the Lord in his power. I love how Tim Keller used to talk about this. Tim Keller used to talk about this is this fear of man, this approval that we seek from others. This how much we care about others.
used to talk about in a way that that we become slaves to the opinions of others. That when you care so much about what other people think that whatever they want, you step two because you care more about what they want as opposed to fearing the Lord and his power and seeking to honor him above what others think, which is important, especially if you're a teenager in the room. Teenagers, listen for a moment. Right now, you're going to feel this intense pressure to care so much about what other kids your age think, to care so much about their opinion, what they think of you, and they're going to call you into doing things that disobey the Lord.
They're going to call you into things that don't honor God at all. And you're going to feel this pull and this desire to so much care about what they think about what the Lord thinks. And let me tell you something, that's not going to change with age. Well, it'll change a little. The people will grow up.
Actually, it'll change a little bit more. Some of those people that you care so much about right now, you real talk, you're not even going to know in 10 years, which is wild if you think about it. that you so structure your life in a way that you care so much about someone that very realistically you're not even going to know in 10 years from now. But the way that it doesn't change is that same desire continues until you become an adult. Because when you become an adult, all of a sudden there are other people that you care so much about in your life.
When your boss tells you to do something, you're so fearful of them and you so desire their approval that you're willing to step to because you care more about them. You care more about who it is that you have in your mind right now that you're fearful of as opposed to being obedient to the Lord and being fearful of him above all things. There's a quote attributed to Spurgeon. Says, "The fear of God is the death of every other fear. Like a mighty lion, it chases all other fears before it." And it's like those voices may seem loud, but if you'll listen intently to the Lord, when the lion roars, everything else is small by comparison.
We want to know God so that we can understand his power and his might to see how much bigger and more powerful and more almighty he is than any of the people in your life than that boss or that supervisor you're so seeking to please. Y'all literally see it for what it is. Your boss might have a gluten allergy. You know what that means?
A piece of bread will take him or her out. They're not big. They're not mighty. They're not powerful in comparison to the almighty eternal God. Like, you've have to see this for what it actually is.
We have to stop caring so dagam much about what other people think about us because their opinions are small and they change with the wind. They shift. I mean, quite literally, the people that we care so much about right now and their opinion of us, y'all, they are going to be dead in 150 years, nobody's going to remember them. Nobody. Maybe some of them might have some great great grandson who goes on whatever the future is of ancestry.com and cares about it, but really they're not they don't last.
And you need to see how that see the eternal scale of how much we should fear and know and revere God in comparison to the people that we order our whole lives around. our peace that gets robbed because we care so much about others. All right. Think I've hit that point hard enough. Fear God.
And hopefully as we seek to do this as God's people, the voice of men, no matter how loud they seek to be, will just seem so small that you can smile and say, "That power is cute by comparison. I just I want to worship and fear the Almighty God instead fall into the same trap as Saul. Third, forsake empty sacrifices. Forsake empty sacrifice. I hope you saw there's three ups up there.
Super Baptist, you guys. Forsake empty sacrifices. Verse 22. And Samuel said, "Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord?
Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, to listen the fat of rams." That right there becomes, this gets repeated over and over again throughout the script. That's part of why I think it's it rhymes. This is going to stick in the people's memory for centuries. It gets repeated in Psalm 40, Psalm 50, Proverbs 21, Isaiah 1, Jeremiah 7, Micah 6, Hebrews 10. All those either reference or allude to this passage.
The first time it's actually stated right here. It's not again that God thinks little of sacrifices. Far from he thinks much of them. The law makes clear that sacrifices are important, but they are not a charade. It's not a performance.
It's not disconnected from a heart that seeks to know God. It was meant to flow out of a heart that worshiped God, that feared him, that revered him, that loved him, that desired him, that loved him with your whole heart and your soul and your mind and strength. And it cannot be a charade. It was meant to be of a people that took God and their sin seriously. Y'all, this is a massive danger for us to come to the Lord with empty sacrifices.
Presenting yourself as a good Christian when your hidden life is filled with disobedience is not a place you want to be in. is not a state of hardened heart that you want to continue in. And y'all, we we're tempted and we do this that we can make Sunday worship attendance and being in a community group, we can hit every every week, twice a week, and our hearts can be far from God because all this can be a charade. There are other ways that we do this. One of the things that I noticed about me and when I corporate prayer with other people is that uh they would be praying and then I would be thinking about the words that I was going to pray because I was concerned about how my prayer sounded and that it made sense and was coherent and was so fixed on that that made prayer about me and how I sounded as opposed to praying along with them to the Lord and being unconcerned concerned and self forgetful in the moment to actually worship God.
You if if that's you, you're making prayer charade. It's it's an empty sacrifice. Other ways that we do this, people can do this with money. You can be generous and show their generosity, but it's performance. It's not out of a heart that seeks to love and obey and delight in God over all things, but it's made to look good before others.
We do this sometimes. Some of y'all may be doing this in your community groups with confession. One of the things you realize in our groups is that we we we're real people with real stuff and we take sin seriously. You might see that that okay, yeah, confession, they care about confessing and and okay, and then you what you're doing is that you'll join in confession, but it's just some small stuff, but really there's some really big stuff right over here and you're not confessing it.
And what you've done is not only been disobedient in confession, but you've made confession a charade to where you're just kind of playing the part to fit in. We do this with singing on Sundays. You may be singing expressively out loud. You may be raising your hands. You may be doing it.
But your mind is completely elsewhere. Your heart is completely elsewhere. And it's just a charade. We do this with good works. any amount of good works that we're that there's this this temptation to do a bunch of good works to think that that's going to gain us favor with God.
I want to get right with God. I want to do these things. I'm here to tell you it's an empty sacrifice. It's a gesture. It's a sh.
This is what Saul thought he could do. Blind to his own hypocrisy. that the fat of any of those rams was not going to make him right with God. So we need to see the danger in that. And as a people this side of Jesus, we should heed this as a cautionary tale.
We should heed Saul, this man who did not follow God, did not obey him, he did not fear God, and that he somehow believed that he could perform empty rituals in order to be right with God and gain favor. All of that flows out of a heart that simply does not know God. Now, as people, this side of Jesus, we have a ritual that reminds us of the God that we fear. That reminds us of the God that we love. That reminds us of the God who sent his son to be crushed for our sin on the cross.
To give us a way to have a life with him, where we get to joyfully follow him and know him. And the result of knowing him flows out of obedience. And one of those rituals, one of those signs is the Lord's Supper, which we're going to take in a moment. I want us to consider the words of 1 Corinthians 11 in preparation as we take the Lord's supper. And I want us to also see the danger of approaching this table as an empty gesture or approaching this table without knowing God.
1 Corinthians 11 23. For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you. But the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." In the same way, he took the cup after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me.
For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he returns. Something we regularly will practice in our Church to come remember what his death meant to us and that he is coming back. Verse 27, whoever therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and the blood of the Lord. that a person examine himself then and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup.
For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That if you come to the table not considering who our God is built on a faith that seeks to know him, that seeks to joyfully receive the grace that he's given us in Christ Jesus. that if this becomes a charade, you're we're we're in danger of this bringing judgment upon ourselves. So, we should consider this.
This meal was ordained to proclaim the Gospel. And if your life exists to proclaim the Gospel, then come to the table in unity to declare his death until he returns. If your life does not exist to proclaim the Gospel, then do not come to this table. Come to the Lord. Come to Jesus in faith.
Discover what it means to know him and to delight in him and to follow him and then the joy that's found in obeying him. But don't come to the table yet. So, what I want to do is I'm going to pray and then we're going to take a moment to prepare ourselves. Band included is going to stay where they're at. In silence, we're going to prepare our hearts and when we are ready, we're going to come joyfully to the table to remember what Jesus has done for us.
If you have a gluten allergy, there's gluten-free in that back corner over there. Let me pray for us. Heavenly Father, I pray that you might prepare our hearts to receive this wonderfully beautiful gift that you've given us. this reminder of your blood that was shed for us. God, I'm thankful that we have a better sacrifice than salt that we have your blood shed for us.
And I pray God that we would understand the value and the importance of that as we come to you in faith, as we come to you in repentance, as we come to you seeking to know you better. And that would change the way that we live. God, if there's anyone here that does not know you, that their life does not exist to proclaim you and make much of you, God, I pray right now that you would pierce through their heart, that they wouldn't come to this table, that we would come to you in faith. Lord Jesus, may you work in our hearts. Amen.
Come when you're ready.
1 Samuel 15 (part 1)
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 typically walk through books of the Bible.
We've been walking through First Samuel. Now, we are in chapter 15. So, you can go ahead and turn there. Uh my kids a couple of years ago uh were at a grandparents house and they discovered the game Operation. But you remember the game Operation?
He's got a little dude. He's got different organs and bones. He's got tweezers and you got to carefully extract every single organ bone from uh this uh guy who's being operated on. But if you hit the edges, what happens?
buzzer goes off. And uh as a kid, I hit the buzzer a lot. I was not going to be a surgeon. Just was not didn't have the steady hand. And I watch my children engage in the same practices just and nailing the edges at every point.
Just trying to get that one little bit of uh organ, one little main thing out. And that is what 1st Samuel 15 feels like. It feels like there's this really good truth in it, this main point, uh, that that you're just trying to to get out of it. But if you move too far to the left or right, you're going to hit the edges, and there's a buzzer that goes off in our minds. The main focus of 1st Samuel 15 is uh, as we continue to watch Saul fall on his face, this is the time that really solidifies the end of his kingship.
like this is this is the last uh form of disobedience that he takes to where God is moving on completely from him. And I I I'd love to focus on that, but there's some edges that we hit that buzzers just go off in our brains where it's like, I don't know if I can focus on that because I just hit this. And what we're going to run into is a very vivid display of the wrath of God. that God's wrath in this passage is vivid in a way that is uh different than a lot of other places in the Scriptures and it's just we're going to hit that edge well all over this chapter. So instead of doing this all in one sermon this week I decided this need to be two sermons.
So 1st Samuel 15, we're going to do it again next week and we're going to hit this main point of what's actually happening in the story. But we got to reckon with this vivid display of the wrath of God because I think there's a weakness within us as we approach the text as Western Americans approaching this text. Like I've got a I've got a weak lower back. It's not getting any better. It's probably always going to be a little bit weak.
So I've had to learn if I'm going to lift something, I've got to take really exaggerated good form. Like I've got to sometimes got to put a belt on and tighten it up really. I might have to get some help to come lift it up. And we've just we've got a little bit of a weak lower back when it comes to the wrath of God as an essential aspect of his divine character. So, we got to slow down.
We're going to take some good form. We're going to get some support here. And we're going to look at this. And my hope in looking at this in 1st Samuel 15 today is this. That we would see God's wrath, this essential aspect of his character, in a new and better way.
that we wouldn't run away from it, but we lean into it. So, let me pray for us, then we'll walk through this together. Heavenly Father, I pray that you would give us ears to hear. Lord, culturally, we we we don't love this subject that we would, if it was in our own choosing, we'd avoid it. We just pick the parts of 1 Samuel that we enjoy more to focus on.
But we know that your word is good. that every single letter is inspired and that it helps us see more of who you are. And that's what we want, Lord. We want to see more of your greatness. So, open our eyes and give us hearts to receive in Jesus name.
Amen. All right. Start over in verse one. And Samuel said to Saul, "The Lord sent me to anoint you king over his people Israel. Now therefore, listen to the words of the Lord, which is Samuel reminding Saul, I am a prophet, and I have a message to you from the Lord.
Verse two, thus says the Lord of hosts. I have noted what Amalecch did to Israel and opposing them on the way when they came up out of Egypt. Now go and strike Amalecch and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey and we'll stop there. Now, if you've read the Bible before, maybe you were with us in the book of Exodus few years ago, come across passages where God takes the Egyptian army and casts them into the Red Sea, kills the whole army.
It's like, oo, that's a lot. That's a lot of death. It's a lot of destruction. But those are that's an army that God defeated. And we can rationalize a bit in our minds, but yeah, I can understand that.
But when you read, "Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant." I mean, there is something in us that says, "What? Did God just tell the Israelites to kill babies?" And there's a part of us that that pauses and says, "What's what's happening here?" I became a Christian in the 2000s uh when Richard Dawkins was all the rage and his brand of atheism was making its way through. It's died down a bunch since then, but I heard when I became a Christian, I started talking about Jesus, I came across people that had that brand of atheism that say, "Do do you do you read your Bible? Do you know that your God is a genocidal maniac?
Have you read these stories where he tells them to genocide whole people and babies?" And I'd hear those arguments and I'll be like, "Oh, well, I have to read this." And it was tough to grapple with. Now you may not be as cynical as that crowd because that brand of belief is quite cynical. But there is something in us that looks at this and goes, "Goodness, how how awful would it have been to receive that command and have to go in and out of homes looking for women and children?" And you may think, how is that in the Bible? And really the core of that issue is how can God be good and command something like this?
That's the heart of that question. So what I want to do is I'm going to we're going to work through not the entirety of 1st Samuel 15. I want to get a gist of this story and I want to come back and I want to interact with that idea. So let's keep working through this so we can get a gist of what the story what's happening here.
Verse four. So Saul summoned the people and numbered them in Tam 200,000 men on foot and 10,000 men of Judah. And Saul came to the city of Amalecch and lay and wait in the valley. Then Saul said to the Kennites, "Go depart, go down from among the Amalachites, lest I destroy you with them. For you showed kindness to all the people of Israel when they came up out of Egypt." So the Kennites departed from among the Amalachites, which for a moment, let's just understand who the Kennites are.
The Kennites are not the Amalachites. This is actually where the uh uh Jethro, Moses's father-in-law, this was his people, part of the Minionites. God doesn't have judgment for the Kennites. So somehow either the tribal leader comes out to them or they send someone in hooded to sneak into the city and talk to the tribal leader. They says, "You need to get all of your people out of here because destruction is coming upon the Amalachites." It's the the Kennites leave.
It's just the Amalachites. Verse 7. And Saul defeated the Amalachites from Havala as far as which is east of Egypt. So they defeat them and the battle as they retreat would have extended even further as they're running away as far east of Egypt. Verse eight.
And he took Aag, the king of the Amalachites, alive, and devoted to destruction all the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared Aag and the best of the sheep and of the oxen, of the fattened calves, and and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them. All that was despised and worthless, they devoted to destruction. So, this is where we're going to spend a lot of our time in next week.
Saul receives this command, disobys this command. He kills lots, women, children, but leaves their evil king, Agag, and the best of their livestock. And next week, we're going to focus on what's happening there. What why did he do this?
And and all the things that follow out of that with Samuel, the prophet, coming to confront him in his disobedience. But eventually when you skip down to verse 32, Samuel is the one who ends up finishing the job. He's the one who fulfills the Lord's command. Verse 32 at the end of this chapter. Then Samuel said, "Bring here to me Aag, the king of the Amalachites." And Aag came to him cheerfully.
Aag said, "Surely the bitterness of death has passed." And Samuel said, "As your sword has made women childless, so shall your mother be childless among women." And Samuel hacked Aag to pieces before the Lord and Gilgal. So he finishes the job and he hacks Aag to pieces. And while indeed there are bigger things in this story than this, there's a bigger main point of what's happening here. I don't think that many of us with our cultural ears hear anything past the killing of children and then ending in the hacking the pieces of their king. Buzzers go off and we're just we we there's something within us that just ah this is hard for us to for our soul to do the heavy lifting of grappling with God's wrath being poured out like this.
So, what do we do with this? What do you do with a story like this? Because many, I'll be honest, have read this and reacted and said, "I I could never worship a God that would condemn the killing of children like this." People have reacted and said, "A good and loving God would never tell his people to do this, to kill an entire another people." And what I would say is that that gut reaction is like jumping into one episode, part of one episode of an entire series and then making a judgment call on the entire series itself. So if you have a if you're at a workplace and your friends are all talking about this television show, you got to watch this show. It's great.
and you say, "All right, I'm going to do it." And you go home and you pull it up and you say, "You know what? I'm gonna go to season 4, episode three." And then you just skip 30 minutes in. And then you watched five minutes and said, "It's not for me." Get back to work the next day. They said, "Did you watch it?" I did. I didn't like it.
Word. You didn't like it. What? What?
I mean, I know the first episode's a little slow. They're developing plot lines, but like I mean, but but by the end of the first episode, I mean, you That's It was good, right? Oh, no. No, no, no. I I I started in season 4.
What? Yeah. Actually, not season four, like episode three. Like I chose like the 30 minute mark and I just didn't like it. Everyone would look at you and say, "I I don't think you understand the story.
You You jumped into this. You don't understand what's actually happening here." So I would say I I don't think we should draw conclusions about the character of God without understanding this story in light of the greater context of God's wrath towards sin. So what I want to do with our time today is I want to take a step back and I want to provide some context to how to understand this story that so visibly displays the wrath of God in light of God's wrath throughout the Scriptures. And we're going to do that. You got to start at the beginning.
You start in Genesis. God makes Adam and Eve and everything is good. Everything is good. It's the way it's supposed to be. But Adam and Eve, when tempted and lured by uh their own desires and tempted by the enemy, they decide to reject God's commands and reject his his goodness that he's offering to them to seek their own version of goodness, what they think is ultimately good.
And when they do this, they bring sin into the world. And sin is like a cancer that infects and invades and destroys and corrupts. And if you've ever walked with someone you love that has cancer and seen what that disease does to them, you hate you hate cancer. There's a whole festivals and movements devoted to the hatred of cancer. And and sin is like a cancer that it it it corrupts and it destroys relationships and it destroys people.
But it's not just like a cancer and that it's a disease in itself. It's actually something bigger than that. Because sin is not just this impersonal force that weaves its way in and out of people. That sin is actually personified. It's embodied by people who are sinners that make valitional choices of their own decisions to disobey God and his commands in favor of what ultimately we want.
So we don't just have sin within us. We are sinners and it's important to understand that and honestly I think we we get that right. I I think that if if someone murdered your child, you would not think of the situation and that person as this murderous instinct within them that was responsible for the death of your child, for the murder of your child. We don't think about sin that way. You wouldn't go to the judge and say, "Have mercy on them.
Courts have mercy on them." Because it was actually the murderous instinct within them. No, we think how it is their murder. And you'd feel wrath towards that murder. It's not an impersonal force within us. We as sinners make an embodied choices to disobey the Lord.
And sin is also in and works through people. And God has wrath not just towards sin but towards sinners. towards us when we consistently and persistently reject him in favor of what we want. And some will look at that and say, "Okay, but if God is so big, like he he's he's a God of love, like why why can't he just overlook this?
Why why does he need to be filled with wrath?" As if love is the opposite of wrath. It's not. I love what the author Becky or Becky Becky Pippert says. She says, "Think how we feel when we see someone we love ravaged by unwise actions or relationships. Do we respond with benign tolerance as we might toward strangers?" Far from it.
Anger isn't the opposite of love. Hate is. And the final form of hate is indifference. God's wrath is not a cranky explosion, but his settled opposition to the cancer, which is eating out the insides of the human race he loves with his whole being. God does not look upon sin with indifference.
He loves his imagebearing creation that he made in his image. When we consistently and persistently reject him and pursue our own desires that further corrupts his creation, the holy love that he has for his creation necessitates a holy hatred of evil. And sinners like you and me make deliberate and repetitive choices every day to reject God's good desire for our lives in favor of what we ultimately think is good. And that's what Adam and Eve did. And that is what continues to happen.
I mean, it spirals out of control quickly. You keep continue to read in Genesis. All of a sudden, their son Cain murders his brother Abel. And then we get this this picture of creation continues to spiral out of control. So much so that by the time Genesis 6 comes around, this is how God describes creation.
And the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord regretted that he had made man on earth. And it grieved him to his heart. So that the Lord said, "I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals, and creeping things, and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them." that every thought and intention of the heart sin had made its corruption so deep that God was sorry that he made humanity. But he sees Noah.
We if you're familiar with this story and he preserves Noah and his family and a selection of animals and preserves them as he floods the earth with wrath and with rain and he kills the rest of humanity. And yeah, people I mean people will they'll struggle with the flood stories as well. That's a hard story to grapple with. I think it's a little bit I think we're honest. I think that 1st Samuel 15 people struggle with this story more than the flood narrative.
I heard one commentator who was a little snarky who said that, you know, the flood narrative gets, you know, plush toys and animated picture and and and and all types of really cute things that sanitize it. And you don't see that ever with 1st Samuel 15. And it's like I I see your point. But there's something in us that struggles with this. But I want to help us see that God has divine right to bring judgment on the very creation that he made.
He made us. He's sovereign and he has rights over us. Y'all, we get mad when your pet, your dog or your cat destroys your house when you're away at work. You come home and you see that your dog has wrecked your house. Our our dog recently defecated on every rug in our house.
Everyone, every single one she could just ruined every rug. Not the hardwood floors that would have been easy clean up. No. Chose every rug upstairs and downstairs that she could get a hold of. And you get angry when that happens.
And guess what? You didn't make that animal. You bought that animal. Whether it was an adoption fee that you felt good about yourself or you went to a breeder like you did not make that animal. You did not form that animal in your image.
But God made us. He made us. He forms us in the womb. He makes us in our image. and he sustains every heartbeat and every breath is by his providential hand.
So he absolutely has rights over his creation that he made and we need to see that. We need to see how God responds to creation, how it is just. Now, after Noah gets off the ark, sin still corrupts. You follow that thread all the way to Genesis 15. But alongside of the corruption that's happening in the earth, God is working together a plan of redemption and salvation.
So, he chooses a man to bring about a people whom he will bring redemption through, and that is Abraham. And he tells Abraham that through him he's going to bless the nations that ultimately as we look at this and the grand picture of the Gospel this is God's redemptive plan through a people through Abraham and he places them in a promised land. He says I'm going to put you in a promised land. But I want us to help us see how even the Lord speaks about the promised land centuries before he puts Abraham and his Israelite people in it. And talking to Abraham, he says, "And they shall come back here." Here he's talking about his lineage, his the his people in the fourth generation.
For the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete. Now that right there, the iniquity of the Amorites, the Amorites are one of the people groups that are in the promised land. What that is a picture of is that the evil of the people in the promised land is being stored up and being seen and remembered over time. And when you read the Old Testament law, you see how wicked the people of the promised land were. This is a people that would sacrifice their own children to foreign gods, that would uh engage in all types of abominable practices.
And God says the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete. They are storing up judgment for themselves. Pull that thread further and then you get to the book of Exodus. The people of God are have been saved and brought out of Egypt. They're sojourning and wandering in the wilderness.
And one of the people in and around the promised land hears about the Israelites nearby. And they're the Amalachites. And the Amalachites come out to destroy the Israelites in Exodus chapter 17. That's what first that's what Saul uh Samuel was referencing at the beginning of 1st Samuel 15 when he says they came out when you were coming out of Egypt. It's this story right here.
I just want to read a few parts of it. In Exodus 17, it says, "Then Amalecch came and fought with Israel at Refidum." So this is they they come out, they wage war, they have this battle. This is the battle if you if you remember the book of Exodus where Moses has to keep his hands up the whole time. If they fall down, they're they're losing. He keeps them up, they're winning, and they end up winning the battle.
But then God hints at that he is going to finish the war. And then verse 14 it says, 'Then the Lord said to Moses, write this as a memorial in a book and recite it in the ears of Joshua that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalecch from under heaven. And God decides right then and there that they they will get judgment for coming out to to defy me and destroy my people. They will get judgment. This is further reiterated in the book of Deuteronomy when Moses is reading the second reading of the law before they enter into the promised land.
Deuteronomy chapter 25 again says, "Remember what Amalecch did to you on the way as you came out of Egypt, how he attacked you on the way when you were faint and weary and cut off your tail who were lagging behind you and he did not fear God. Therefore, when the Lord your God has given you rest from all your enemies around you, and the land of the Lord God is giving you for an inheritance to possess, you shall blot out the memory of Amalecch from under heaven. You shall not forget." And we get further imagery of the evil that they engaged in coming to take out the Israelites. And God says, "You will blot them out." And then if you read the book of Deuteronomy, I think the clarification is also helpful because you might get the impression that okay, they're it's just this group is wicked and the people of God are really good.
If you actually read uh the story, the people of God, they failed. They're sinners, too. But there's a wickedness in the land that has to be judged. So much so that in Deuteronomy chapter 9, he tells his people, "Do not say in your heart after the Lord, your God has thrust them out before you. It is because of my righteousness that the Lord has brought me in the into possess the land.
Whereas it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is driving them out before you. But they have continuously rebelled against God and rejected him and engaged in all types of sinful ways. And the same wrath that was poured out in the floodwaters in Genesis is now going to be poured out through his people. And then we get to fast forward to our story today and we read that they defeat the Amalachites. Now I think the most precise way to understand what this defeat is is that this is national destruction.
This is the destruction of the Amalachite nation in a way that they will no longer threaten the people of God as a nation again. God raises up nations and he takes them down. And I think that's the most precise way to think about this because the Amalachites are actually not completely annihilated. I mean, you keep reading. We're going to see this in 1st Samuel chapter 30, but when you get to chapter 30, show back up when it says, "Now when David and his men came to Ziglag on the third day, the Amalachites had made a raid against the Ngev and against Ziglag." So we see that the these people in some form actually do exist, but they do not exist in this national threat that they once were.
They will no longer threaten the people of God like they once did. They will be destroyed. And I also want to help us see the Amalachites and and how the the worthy of judgment and how much they opposed and hated the people of God. So much so that if you keep following the thread of the New Testament, you get the book of Esther, which is in the middle of the Old Testament, but it's actually uh the period is actually the very end of the writings of the of the Old Testament. If you get all the way to the book of Esther, you see a descendant of Aag, an Amalachite, who still wants to exterminate the people of God.
When you get to the book of Esther, chapter 3, it says, "After these things, King Hasseras promoted Hmon, the Hmon, the Agagite." That's a descendant of Aag, the very king, the Amlite king that was hacked to pieces by Samuel. But some of Heamadathan advanced him and set him on the throne above all the officials who were with him. And it goes on to say in verse six, Hmon sought to destroy all the Jews, the people of Mori throughout the whole kingdom of Heserus. So there's this instinct to want to destroy the people of God even still. This is why if you if you read some of the writings and hear some of the things that were said by the Jews in the Holocaust, why they called the Nazis Amalachites.
This is a people that wanted to destroy them. This is very much a kill or be killed situation with the Amalachite nation. And God when his people are threatened and he is defied like this he has divine right to bring a nation down. Job 12 says he makes nations great and he destroys them. He enlarges nations and leads them away.
Our God, the sovereign ruler over all things, is within his divine prerogative and rights to bring a nation low. Now, I hope hopefully that gives us some context for what's happening here in 1st Samuel 15. And yet still, I think there is something within us that struggles with this. And what I want to push on a bit is that that struggle actually I think is more of a cultural one because I'll be honest there are many cultures outside of the west outside of America that struggle with different parts of the Bible. They actually don't struggle as much with this.
They don't struggle with God bringing wrath on a people and bringing judgment on them. the other cultures that have a higher view for the justice of God that there other cultures that have endured all s types of injustice where they they can't they they don't want to think of a God as good if he's indifferent towards evil. Other cultures have endured true injustice in ways that we are insulated from that they long for a God to bring justice. They long for a God to pour out wrath. They don't want to worship a God who's indifferent towards evil.
But that's not a high value for us. And what happens is is that in the west you stumble upon stories like this and then we make the judgment, no, this is not a good God. I love what Tim Keller says in Reasons for God when he's talking about the wrath of God. He says, "Why should Western cultural sensibilities be the final court in which to judge whether Christianity is valid?" And it's like we we don't have the final say. We're pretty star spangled awesome, but we don't have the final say and who God is and his character and if it's good or not.
So, some don't like this. Others have tried to distance themselves from this. They try to distance Christianity from this. You'll hear the argument, okay, yeah, but that's the Old Testament God, but the New Testament God is way different.
Like when Jesus comes and like he's holding children and he's teaching, he's a sage. Like this is way different. And that's like two things. First, I don't think you've read this Jesus. I don't think you've read this New Testament.
Get to that in a moment. Second, that's not a new new teaching at all. It's called Marcianism. That's a heresy from the third century. So that's been around a long time.
this idea of that the Old Testament God is completely different from the New Testament God. But back to my first point, I don't think that you've actually read the words of Jesus. Because if you think that this form of wrath that we see in 1 Samuel 15 is categorically different than the wrath that it shows up in the New Testament, well, in some ways I might agree with you because what Jesus talks about, I think I would argue is probably way worse because Jesus still takes seriously sin and how it incurs wrath. He says in Matthew 10, he says, "Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.
And as Jesus is developing this doctrine of hell for us to understand eternal punishment, he says in Mark chapter 9, "And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched. for everyone will be salted with fire. That's the language of the New Testament. And I would argue that's a far worse judgment that was poured out on the Amalachites.
I would argue that if you accept the reality of hell, which we do, the judgment of the Amalachites is benign by comparison. So we see from all the new the whole Bible that God has wrath towards sin and sinners and we deserve it. We deserve wrath. And and here's the deal. I I think even Westerners like us.
I think we even are on board with that idea to an extent. Like I think we we get that. But I think the difference is is we want to be the ones who dictate what is worthy of wrath and what isn't. I mean, because the moment that we read a story of of of someone who murdered a child, it's like, let him burn. The moment that you read a story like Birdie Maidoff, who swindled people out of billions of dollars and ruined so many people's lives, it's like, oh, there's a special place for him there.
And so, I think even part of us agrees, yes, some people deserve wrath, but we are the ones who want to dictate who deserves wrath. So I think we feel this but we are creatures. We are creation and creatures do not dictate what is worthy of justice. A holy God does. The creator God does.
So when God sees the evil of the Amalachites over generations and decides as a judge that he's going to destroy this nation and their reign of terror, he is right in doing so. And it vividly ends back in 1533. And Samuel said, "As your sword has made women childless, so shall your mother be childless among women, highlighting all the evil of Aag." And Samuel hacked AAG to pieces before the Lord in Gilgal. Our God does not let the guilty go unpunished. Wrath is a part of the character of God.
God cannot be good if he does not have wrath towards evil. God cannot be good if he does not have wrath towards injustice. God cannot be good if he does not oppose evil. That's all over the Scriptures. The Old Testament, one of the the the best summaries of God's character shows up in Exodus chapter 34 when God is giving Moses the Ten Commandments.
And God describes himself in a description that gets repeated throughout the whole rest of the Old Testament. And I think it's a wonderful summary of the character of who our God is. He says, this is the Lord speaking audibly. The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation. that God was slow to anger with the Amalachites from generation to generation and then he brings judgment because God will by no means clear the guilty.
Aag could not flagrantly and repeatedly defy God without judgment. And Aag stood in judgment as he was hacked and pierced to death. And if that causes us to be fearful of God, Amen. we should we we're commanded to we should fear the power and the might of God. But our God also is abounding in steadfast love because we like AAG flagrantly and repeatedly defy God's will.
We boastfully defy and disobey his commands. We celebrate how we listen to the commands of God and do the exact opposite. And the good news of the Gospel is that we get an offer of escape from the wrath of God. That God does not make us stand in our judgment like AAG if we don't want to. We get a substitute.
The prophet Isaiah looking forward to Jesus says this. But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace. And with his wounds we are healed.
Jesus comes to stand in the place of the wrath of God the father. And Jesus comes to take the hacking that Aag received, the destruction of his flesh. Our God is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. And the most abounding example of the steadfast love is of God is Jesus coming and standing in our place and the wrath of God being directed back at himself as he's hacked to death. The good news of the Gospel is that we do get a substitute for the wrath.
And my hope is that as we consider how difficult some of these stories are to receive, we contextualize it and bring it into the greater story of God's wrath. And we remember, praise God, I deserve wrath, but Jesus stands in my place. And then we worship Christ alone. The band's going to come up and we're going to worship. And Christ alone is a song we'll sing.
And I love one of the verses. It says, "Till on that cross, as Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied." That as Christians, we accept the whole council of God's word. And we don't run away from the wrath of God, but we celebrate that we know where that wrath was ultimately and most gloriously displayed. It was at the cross. And my hope is two things.
that a that if you don't belong to God, if you've not laid down your life, if you not I mean that the testimony we heard from Marion earlier of deciding I want I want to be a Christian. I want to be allin with Christ. I want you to see that the vivid display of God's wrath that was we saw in in 1 Samuel that Jesus hints about that that teaches about later that that wrath will fall out on us if we stand in our own sin. But the good news of the Gospel is that Jesus Christ comes to stand in the gap. And my hope is that you would believe and that you'd put your full hope and faith in Christ as your substitute.
My other hope is this for us as Christians reading this story. I think there are times where we so seeing and celebrate the goodness of the Gospel and how he paid for sins that sometimes we forget what sin costs and how destructive the force of sin is in our lives. My hope is is that we sing and worship in this song that we'd consider our own sin that that earned judgment that Jesus paid for with his precious blood and we who are living in sin would say I don't want that anymore. this would this would energize us towards repentance. And in our groups this week, we'd look at our sin and just say, "Oh, I don't I don't want to sin anymore.
I know I've incurred wrath." And that would lead us to Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, I pray you've given us hearts to hear your difficult word. God, I pray that you would give us faith. You'd give us obedience. You'd call us into repentance.
by not running from your wrath, but leaning into it and celebrating and worshiping you as a fearsome, holy, wonderful, loving God. But we need your work in our hearts to see this with clear eyes. So Lord, go to work in Jesus name. Amen.
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.