The Cave of Adullam： My Story — Fred Tomlinson

David in the Cave of Adullam

Our bibles shall we. And we will perhaps open them to the first book of samuel in the old testament samuel and chapter 22. First samuel 22 i'm just going to read two verses from the top of the chapter.

So david departed from there and escaped to the cave of adolim and when his brothers and all his father's household heard of it they went down there to him. Everyone who was in distress and everyone who was in debt and everyone who was discontented gathered to him and he became captain over them.

Now there were about 400 men with him. Amen. I'd like to do something a little bit unusual this morning for me um i'd like to find several features or make several observations from these couple of verses here and and then illustrate them from my own personal story.

And i pray that god may challenge you as you listen and may god speak to you. Amen. So david as you know very well i'm sure had been chosen by god. The fact of the matter is at this particular time the ruling king was saul.

Um interesting uh he was head and shoulders above all others. Uh he had been chosen by the people and i guess they looked at him and figured well he's just the man that we need. And so he was chosen and established.

But the fact of the matter is that at a certain stage which we're not going to look at or examine this morning god had spoken very clearly through his prophet concerning something that he was required to do and he compromised.

He compromised with the word of god. Um it's interesting that in his compromise there was a sense in which he could claim he had done what the prophets had told him to do but the fact is he had only partially done what god had instructed him to do and partial obedience in the end is seen by god as disobedience.

And so that was a very serious move. And then of course the story continues from that stage on and eventually we find ourselves in in the 16th chapter here of this very book that we're looking at and he comes to terms with the fact that god has indeed rejected him from being king.

And he made that well-known statement in response a very tragic very sad statement he said i have played the fool and i have erred exceedingly. I can't imagine a more sobering and challenging even heart-wrenching thing for a man who has been used by god.

Um and then to find himself toward the end of his life in a moment where he looks back and his his own testimony concerning his life was simply this i've played the fool i've erred exceedingly. I please i pray god that he will please keep me to the end of this journey and i would pray that for you also we're never beyond falling.

And um there's a challenge right there that i could say a lot more about but in any event this is exactly what's happened. And whereas saul had been chosen by the people god made a choice and god chose not the most likely person but the most unlikely person.

You can remember the story i'm sure where he is selected among his brethren by god but through samuel the prophet and this young fellow david was the one chosen and he was he was anointed there in that situation of course he wasn't recognized as the king.

David as a Type of the Messiah

There would be two future events so far as the anointing would be concerned one having having been anointed in his own father's backyard as it were he would be anointed king over judah. And then there would be a third recognition where he's installed a king over all of the nation anyway that's that's the kind of background we're in between those events as we look here in this chapter.

And he's being pursued by saul. He's hated by saul. Um saul and those who are with saul obviously are rejecting david. David is being hated and hunted and at this particular stage he's found refuge in a hole on the hillside which is referred to a cave the cave of a dolom.

In very many ways david stands out in scripture as a type of christ himself. And there are many scriptures that can find supporting that particularly to be found in the new testament um as is the case with types and those who in various ways represent something that is going to be fulfilled in the future.

Certainly in particular where someone is representing christ in some way it's not because they are perfect human beings. It's not because every single aspect of their lives is just a carbon copy of of christ who would come in the fullness of time.

And that's certainly true for david as a matter of fact i was reading just this morning how the um the 21st chapter ends in other words immediately before these verses i've just read to you and he's disguising himself and is in great fear for his own life and so on because which is the basis of him then fleeing as we find in the 22nd chapter and in the verses i've just read to you.

But certainly it is true that in many ways in many respects um he is set apart from other men and his is the way he rules the nation and so on the kingdom are all things that are very very significant as he is a type of the messiah.

But when i read these things about david here my mind is turned to the lord himself our lord the lord jesus. And we can see a similarity here though the reasons and background are different. We know as we think about the times in which we live today.

Indeed right in our own culture at this point in time we know that the lord jesus christ is is unrecognized by our culture. He's he's hated within our culture. He's rejected. Certainly he's rejected as the anointed one.

He is rejected as the triumphant warrior. Indeed although we know from the very scriptures we have before us just now that there's a day coming when and likely quite soon when he will be revealed to all and he'll be revealed as the king of kings and as the lord of lords.

And he we're told will subdue kingdoms beneath his feet and under his own authority. And so we have that very much in our mind today. But today i pose this question where will he be discovered. Where will he be discovered at this moment in time.

Finding Christ Outside the World's Palaces

I can tell you this with full assurance that he will not be discovered in the king's palaces of this world. He will not be discovered in the great cathedrals of our nations. And perhaps he will not be discovered in the mega churches.

Um but i believe it may be that he will be discovered in a cave of a dolom in an unlikely place. An interesting feature about the cave where david was hiding was as he looked out from that cave he would see bethlehem in the distance.

And he would also look down on the very spot where he had slain the mighty goliath. Without the slaying of goliath there would be no dolom. And of course i'm finding a parallel as i'm saying these things to the lord jesus we're going to find him where he is near to the place where he experienced that supreme victory even the cross of calvary.

Amen. David goes to this place and soon he is joined by 400 men. And we've read there in the verse how that the men that come to him they're coming with purpose. They want to find david. They want to be with him.

They're recognizing him as god's choice. And the people who are coming are people who have their own issues. We'll think about that again in just a moment. The interesting thing for you and me is that we won't need and we never need to initiate a search for him.

God Pursues Those He Has Chosen

Um he knows he knows who i am. He knows who you are. I believe that on the basis of what i'm reading in scripture that he had my name before him before i was conceived in my mother's womb. The apostle paul reminds us that we were chosen in him before the foundations of the world before creation.

We were chosen in him. He knows me. He has always known me. He has always known you. And so i don't need to find him as a matter of fact. Paul on another occasion said there's no one who seeks after the lord.

It's this touches on a much bigger subject than we're dealing with just now. But the fact is i do not need to try to find him. He is the one who is pursuing me. He has been pursuing me from my earliest days.

And i can say to you he has been pursuing you from your earliest days. What i need to do what you need to do is to discover him. We don't need to find him. We don't need to launch out a program on a program to somehow find where he is.

Where is he located. How shall i find him. What will i need to do. No no none of those things apply. He knows who i am exactly and i've never been out of his sight. He's been aware of me from the earliest days.

A Christian Heritage and Childhood Conversion

I only need to discover him. And that's where i think about my own life. I know that there's people listening to me right now who know a little bit about my background. But i was born into a family where my my dad was physically handicapped and where my mother had a heavy load to carry during those early days because the six-year second world war was just drawing to an end at the time i'm thinking about and i was four years of age at that time and my dad was anxious that his son his only son at that point would be saved as he would have referred to it.

He wanted to be sure that i surrendered my life to christ. And this is something i can remember very vividly sitting across from an old coal fireplace and my dad facing me and he was seeking to lead me into the knowledge of the lord jesus as my saviour.

I prayed what is today referred to as the sinner's prayer. I prayed after my dad and i had a bible even at that time i don't know. My dad probably gave it i'm sure he gave it to me didn't go out and buy it.

Age four i had a bible and i can remember that because i had it for a long time afterwards that written in the front. I can't tell you that i wrote this on the day or how many days later but i had it written in there that i was saved on such and such a day.

I wish had the bible today but i don't but there you are and my my family belonged to a christian group who at that time in particular were known as plymouth brethren. They in the 1960s for reasons we're not thinking about just now they decided to change the title that they would operate under and they would become known as christian assemblies.

But my father and mother belonged to that group and so did other members of my family as a matter of fact on my mother's side i might just add that she became a christian as the result of hearing some singing out the back of the house where she lived in a little alley a little cul-de-sac that ended right behind their house and there were some other houses backing onto that area that i can remember and she went out to see what was going on and there was a group of brethren people who were holding an open air meeting there and she went down and stood with them and she gave her life to jesus that night.

And as the result of that her mother became a christian and their two sisters became christians. And then there was the story of how she met my father who was a christian as well and belonged to the brethren but a different assembly.

The fact that i'm trying to establish is that i was privileged to be born into that home and where our family life centered around the bible and centered around meetings and around christian fellowship and so on.

Leaving a Familiar Christian Environment

That was the environment in which god saw to it that i was born and i was known to him at that time but if i can fast forward a number of years quite a number of years and i can tell you that i was in my early 20s and i was a committed christian.

That's how i would have seen myself and understood myself. I was married i had one son another son was soon to be born and i i had a good job and a career ahead of me. But what i was unaware of at that particular point in time was that god who knew me was pursuing me and he was pursuing my wife sheila also and although the world would look on and would make references to chance and circumstances and so forth being just the way life is i can say that i do believe and i see it very very clearly never more clearly than today that god was leading and directing us.

He was pursuing me and i was made aware of of a particular meeting that was taking place regularly in a house in the city of liverpool where we lived and i personally had no interest in going at all and it was not a brethren meeting and so that was disqualified.

It has been top of the chart to start with but eventually i did go and there were about 50 people as i remember in the room at that point in time it was a it was an old house it was it was it was going to be demolished in a few years time so it was semi-derelict it was a kind of suburban cave if you will and i discovered in that house that jesus was there and it was a true cave of a dolem and it had a clear view of the cross i can tell you and as the result of what was going on there i may say a little bit more about it in a few minutes but as the result of what was going on in that meeting and in that house and what was going on in my heart and i can speak for my wife sheila also what was going on in our hearts and our response to what we were exposed to enabled god to take our knowledge of god to a whole new level.

And as the result of that within four years my career had been drawn to an end god had brought great changes into our lives. And as i say four years after that first time of going into that house i with sheila became involved in full-time ministry and i was included in the leadership of that church that was there and i thank god for the way in which he was leading us at that time.

It was unforeseen it was not anywhere in my thoughts or in our thoughts in the earlier days this was just an amazing development that had to be god and it wasn't something that we were forced or into.

It was something that was responded to with a with a glad heart and with the with a sense of excitement and anticipation as god was opening something completely new to us in the scriptures. It's very obvious that the cave of adulim carried a stigma with it.

The Cave as a Haven for the Broken

David who was there was stigmatized and we can be very sure that anyone who gathered with him and everyone who gathered with him were a people who were stigmatized. Yet knowing that many came i hope you can see some parallels without me trying to explain each and everything that i'm touching on here as i say these things.

But david very obviously carried in his person a moral quality a certain kind of magnetism. There was something about this man that drew people to want to be there to respond to him and he there in that unlikely place in that cave of adulim was able to establish what charles wesley would refer to as a haven to take the shipwrecked in because that's the kind of people that were coming these were people who were in trouble and they were not merely how can i say this.

They were not merely accepted by david when they came but they become became transformed as the result of being there with him. And let me just say again as i think of my own life or our lives together i there's a lot of decades gone in between that initial event and here we are at this stage in life.

But i can say now i i know that forever i will be thankful to god for those those days which were our initial days of involvement in that that was taking place. This was not some kind of crazy bizarre charismatic thing.

There was a lot of things going on around at that time. This was not part of those. This was not the result of a man or a group of men deciding to plant a new work but this was a sovereign solid work which was indisputably of god and was incredibly special.

For that very reason when we came to that place we came with a good deal of knowledge of the bible um we had listened over many many years to to teaching of the bible and exposure to the things of god without any question.

And yet what we were being exposed to seemed to come with fresh light. Somehow things that were familiar passages of scripture that were familiar to us in so many ways became quickened and were alive to us and and as well as that there were new things there was new discoveries that we were able to make concerning the truth of god and concerning the lord himself.

All these things together the fresh light the new revelations that seem to be coming to our hearts in those days became integrated into our lives and integrated into our minds and into our understanding and became as it were a foundation and a basis for what today i can say has been a lifelong ministry into which god has called us to be.

Features of a True Cave of Adullam

Um my purpose today in sharing these things is not to try and give you a blow by blow detailed account of everything uh but i'd like to just to just briefly point in one or two directions which were particular features of what we were exposed to which i think i can safely say would always be expected as features of any true adolem a place where jesus is.

Certainly these details of what i will when i experience and what i will describe are different from what david was facing. The particulars are different. Certainly. But there are features which are exactly the same.

They're perhaps just on a different level. That's all. But these were broken lives coming to david and finding rescue and finding his love and his embrace there in that place. But they were also being transformed as i have indicated as well.

There would be many others who come. I should tell you that in case you're reading on a little further there'd be many others who would come. There would be thousands of people who would gather with david before the story's out.

And many of those that came were people who were quoted in scripture as being mighty men of war and so forth as they're described at this particular juncture in the story. These are people who are in trouble as we see in the text in verse two who come to him.

And so the details are different. But there's a sense in which well isn't this exactly what god is doing in his in a local assembly a place where christ is perhaps the most unlikely of places some kind of cave of a dolem.

If you will there'll be. There'll be the presence of god by his spirit. And there will be people who will be drawn by his spirit not because of our advertising but by his spirit. He will draw and gather those who he will have there in order that he can minister to them and transform their lives according to his own good pleasure.

And one thing is certain that these people that would came on this occasion would be included with the entire group who would be known in the future as david's mighty men. I only knew Plymouth Brethren meetings.

We would never venture beyond the context of our own assemblies. We would visit other assemblies we would have as young people youth camps in north Wales with people from many different assemblies around that area and so on.

But it was always within that context. We had no tv. There was no tv for us at that point in time. So there was no tv ministries that we were exposed to. There were no music cds. There weren't even music cassettes at that point in time.

Everything was different. I look back on these things. You can't change how things are today. But I'm glad I was born at that particular time because I didn't face so many of the distractions that I think so many people face today.

But there the road was narrow. There were good people who believed the bible to be the word of God men who would teach in the assemblies that were solid men with a desire to help and minister to young people as we were in those earlier days.

Stepping Beyond Religious Comfort Zones

Certainly. But I can remember going up the steps of the house I've described and I remember going up with a lot of reservation. I'd resisted going for a long time here now I was climbing up the steps a group of steps up into the front door of this place and based on the fact that I I was a policeman so I wasn't isolated in in other senses.

But as far as my faith and my Christianity I was isolated here. I was venturing out beyond the wall if you will and I had a sense that really I shouldn't be doing this. I really shouldn't be going to this place.

But the fact you know is I was outside of of my comfort zone. I was outside of that which was familiar to me. I was I was unsettled in my heart. I was to some degree I think I was upset that I was even doing this.

It was probably Sheila encouraging me strongly. No it was the Lord. I know that. But but the fact of the matter is I was going to be exposed to the way of God more perfectly that that's what would happen.

I didn't know that I was unaware of that. I wouldn't have wanted to have admitted it at all. But the fact of the matter is as I proceeded on that particular day God would begin to open up a new chapter in our lives as a matter of fact from that moment from that night our lives would begin to pivot off in a totally different direction.

I can say looking back and know that this is true without question almost everything about our lives almost everything would be changed as the result of going to that cave of a dolom and responding to what we were exposed to in that place.

Encountering God's Holiness and Love

And I thank God for it with all my heart what we found in that cave of a dolom was perhaps I've already said this but let me say it in a different way was the very presence of God we it was that sense of his holiness.

I'd heard about it I knew scriptures that related to it but somehow I was actually exposed to it on that occasion. What what was going on in that place. It wasn't some kind of rave up it wasn't nor was it some kind of sober somber religious event at all.

I can say this very honestly it was like a searchlight. Like it like God's searchlight that was just blazing a beam right into my heart and illuminating my soul. I had never dabbled in the occult. I had never taken illegal drugs.

I'd never become hooked on pornography. I'd never been unfaithful to my wife. I was a committed Christian. Yet my response in that context was one of profound uncleanness. And I think and believe that's exactly what we would expect.

Should we find ourselves in the presence of God no matter who we are what kind of good lives or moral lives we've lived in his holy presence his searchlight searching out every crevice and corner of our hearts and of our minds.

We would say with the apostle we're just undone we're exposed amen. I even had literally hot and cold sweats. I've been heard to say that before that literally is what happened as I sat in that room. And I can say I know this to be true.

If I had not been in the center of the room in the seating position where it would be profoundly awkward to have got out I would have left the meeting quickly. But God had arranged the seat for me and I was crowded in and I was held there.

And God's continued to make himself known to me. And I discovered something else in the context of his presence and his holiness was his love. And his love caused my reservations and my resistance to evaporate.

I thought I knew so much and believed that I would object to so much that I'd be exposed to based on what conversations I'd had prior to being there. I know I was heard to say to Sheila on one occasion just prior to actually going there when I met socially with one or two of the people from that group I went home and said to Sheila I've never seen love like that never seen it you know I think I think on that occasion that I've been describing as as things began to unfold I I felt like the prodigal coming home.

It wasn't like so this is different and so I don't agree with this or I'm uncomfortable with something else. Something was melting in my own heart in the presence of God. I knew some lovely folks some lovely people Christian people in my background.

But there was something different there. If you'd asked me to try and write down and sort of list and categorize what these feet I wouldn't have known how to answer those questions. But there was something different.

There was an almost a mystical feature to everything. As I say I was a policeman. I wasn't stupid I wasn't just caught in some silly web. I remember one man some of you will know who I'm speaking about.

He's gone to be with the Lord now. But his name we knew. We just knew him although he's quite a bit older than we were as Dave. But but I remember in conversation with him I I truly became convinced if push came to shove that man would lay his life down for me.

There was just something about that love that was flowing from him which I believe was the love of Christ himself flowing through that man. And these things were making profound impressions. There was another feature there and it was the preaching of the Word of God.

Preaching the Word in the Power of the Spirit

And as I have indicated in my background I had listened to some very gifted Bible expositors. But this was different. This was very different. I think it was as different as this Paul writes to the Thessalonians and he said for our gospel did not come to you in word only but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction just as you know what kind of men we prove to be among you for your sake.

That's exactly what was happening. It wasn't just a very gifted exposition of the text. It was that. But it was more than that. And I think that's exactly what Paul's saying he said when you listen to us.

It wasn't just words. He wasn't merely teaching what he could find in the Old Testament scriptures and so on but that Christ lived in him. The Spirit of God was working through him. So his words were quickened.

This is that mystical strange feature that we feel beggared to try to describe it or analyze it but when you're exposed to it and your heart is open to it you know it's there. It's another aspect of hearing the shepherd's voice and recognizing this is the shepherd who's speaking to me.

That certainly was taking place on those occasions. And to hear the speaker on one occasion say tonight I'm going to talk to you about God. You know I think that statement which is an accurate verbatim statement kind of sums up the kind of thing I'm trying to communicate to you it wasn't.

Yes we want to know about the Bible. We want the Bible to be explained to us and applied to our lives in a very detailed way. But somehow there's something beyond it all and I believe that this is what was going on there.

I was exposed to godly men preaching the text but causing our hearts to burn within us. You'll remember the passage of scripture I'm thinking about when I say that this was not just clever preaching but this preaching was bringing us to God and there's a world of difference.

I don't know what David said to the men as they gathered around him but I'm confident that in one way or another his goal would be to bring them to God. And this I believe is a key feature to this ad-dolem experience.

The Gospel as Transforming Power

You know over the years I've I've witnessed many broken people being drawn by the Spirit of God not to a cave in the hillside but to the cross of King David's greatest son even the Lord Jesus. And I've witnessed the gospel working.

Whatever I've known of it in my own life is one thing but I've seen it working in the lives of others where it's not merely words Paul would say he was not ashamed of the gospel of Christ because it was the power of God to bring deliverance to men and women.

And we've seen that before I close. Let me give you just one example. One person that we witnessed being drawn in the way that I'm describing to you. Her name was Alison. I can't tell you all her story this morning but to start with her parents wanted a son and she wasn't a son.

She was a daughter and she was rejected from the beginning. But she became a medical nurse in her final attempt to commit suicide she poured kerosene over herself and ignited it. Her scars head to toe would testify to the horror that she had known after performing a leucotomy.

The medical world had exhausted their resources and she was left to vegetate in a psychiatric ward consigned to the rubbish bin of society. But God had a different plan for Alison. She was destined to become an outstanding trophy of his transforming grace.

And one Tuesday evening that I remember very clearly against the better judgment of her psychiatrist he had given permission for her to come out with two Christian men who happened to be elders of our church to come to a meeting.

I will never forget that dear violently shaking woman and the horrible scars that were obvious on her legs. It wasn't that night but God met Alison and she became a treasured friend. She lived in the church house and later lived in her own apartment and became a valued and deeply loved member of the Devonshire Christian Fellowship until many years later the Lord took her home to himself.

I could share stories of others many are many of them would have professed that they were Christians and yet they were struggling with issues struggling with demonic bondages of one sort or another. Sometimes things they had inherited sometimes and perhaps more commonly things that they had acquired.

Spiritual Warfare and the Enemy's Access

You know the apostle Peter said that the devil goes about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. And in the book of Ecclesiastes chapter 10 and verse 8 I read. He who breaks the hedge will be bitten by a serpent.

Did you know that men and women rip down that hedge. And when they do they invite demonic trouble. And it can come in many ways. You can rip the hedge down as the result of many activities you engage in.

It could be something as common as your smartphone and you rip it. Rip a hedge down and expose yourself to things that you should never have exposed yourselves to. And as I've said to many people over the years the you know the the painting that's been drawn of Jesus standing at the door with the text behold I stand at the door and knock.

If any man open he would come in and sup with them and so on. Someone saw that painting after it'd been drawn and commented to the to the painter that he'd made a terrible mistake because he missed something and he wanted to know what it was.

He said well there's no handle on the door. And the artist said well well that's by design he said because the handle's on the inside not on the outside. And so the the fact is what we're thinking about is just the lord in his grace.

He is as I've referred to him many times he's the perfect he's the ultimate gentleman he makes himself known to us. I'm required to open up my life to him and so are you. But by complete contrast he who is referred to in the text of first peter 5 8 that I just quoted to you is the devil.

And I believe that these dark spirits they're not perfect gentlemen they're gate crashers. And where we open the door a chink we break a little bit of the hedge down we engage in some illegal immoral activity something forbidden by God.

We inevitably give an occasion to the enemy who is like a roaring lion seeking who he may desire seeking to rush in. You know I was thinking about this yesterday as I was driving quite locally and for some reason I was aware of this text in in my mind that I'm quoting to you from Peter but the picture I saw in my mind was was you know these strange people who climb up cliff faces and we've seen the pictures of them.

I've never been close to one while he or she has been doing it but you see them and the amazing thing is they go up sheer faces and sometimes the rock is actually leaning against them and they've got no ropes or anything but with their fingers and their toes they're finding little crevices that they can hold on to and pull themselves up and it's just an amazing thing but let me tell you the devil does things like that he's not he doesn't always come like a like a great bulldozer and crash into our lives but he'd be climbing there and he'll find any little chink that we give to him and he'll gain an advantage and progress and his goal is according to this text to devour us to devour my testimony to devour my faith in Christ and so on.

Complete Allegiance to Jesus

Is there a balm in Gilead? The text reads and the answer is yes. Yes indeed. We understand that in responding to he who is the balm in Gilead we'll be required to transfer our allegiance just as these men coming to David in a dolom they were transferring their allegiance from Saul to David and in responding to him who is making himself known to us revealing himself by his presence and through his word by his love to us to respond demands that I shift my allegiance completely from myself from the world from every other thing and give myself to him wholly and surrender my entire life your entire life to him.