The Unstolen Crown

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Don Filcek; 2 Samuel 1:1-16 The Unstolen Crown

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You're listening to a podcast of Recast Church in Matawan, Michigan. This week, Pastor Don Filsak is preaching from his series,
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The Warrior Poet King, Study of 2 Samuel. Let's listen in. I'm Don Filsak.
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I'm the lead pastor here. And welcome to 2022. This year we're going to spend a good chunk of the year studying through the book of 2
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Samuel, as Linda said. And that might not mean a lot to some of you. You're kind of not quite sure what the content of that means.
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But let me clarify that this is going to take us through the kingdom of Israel under the reign of King David.
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So what you need to understand is over the next year or so, we're going to be looking at the life of David.
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It's going to be the main focus. Like the David that killed Goliath, David. The David that had his childhood spent as a shepherd writing songs to God out under the stars.
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The David of whom it was said, Saul has killed his thousands, but David his tens of thousands.
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King David, to whom we'll see in this book, promised that one of his line, one of his lineage would sit on the throne forever and ever and ever and have an eternal reign.
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It's going to be an interesting journey through a book that tells us a theological history. It's important that we understand when we're looking at the
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Old Testament, when we're looking at these historical accounts, there are much more than just merely telling us information so that we could pass some kind of quiz or something like that.
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Like how many of you, just in history, you're like, what are we going to do with this? What's the point? When you took a history class,
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U .S. history, Michigan history, whatever history, world history, you're like, okay, I'm reading about dead people.
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Interesting. And that's it. But we're going to see that David was a man after God's own heart.
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He was a man who sought to live in integrity before God. He failed in many ways that make it clear that his life is not held up as a wholesale prescription for our lives.
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I say that because I think a lot of people have a tendency to think these Old Testament people are heroes.
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They rose above all circumstances and pleased God and got his attention and all of a sudden
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God fell in love with them because they were super amazing. The goal of this book, as we study it, let me get this out of the way at the start.
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This is not do it like David did it. That's not the purpose of the book. But where he lives well, we can indeed affirm that.
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And where he falls short of God's will, we can learn from his mistakes as well. And we will find a fair share of both sides of that coin in the life of human
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David. David just like us. David relating to the world just like us. David who had his shortcomings, his own personal struggles with sin and difficulties.
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And so I want to encourage us all here at the start of this series to consider that God is always working in the pages of Old Testament history.
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He's always a main player. The main player in all of these accounts. Even where he's not mentioned.
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And sometimes we learn significantly by the fact that he's not mentioned in a certain account. But we are never meant to stray far from the presence of God in the lives of his people as we're studying his word.
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Now let me give you just a quick brief synopsis of history. That brings us up to, kind of the history of Israel.
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That's going to bring us up to where we're at when we encounter 2 Samuel. So just briefly let me start with the Exodus. You probably all know that the people of God, about 70 people went to Egypt, down to Egypt.
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Under Isaac or Jacob rather. And with Jacob about 70 people went down there and about a million left.
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So under Moses they had become slaves. They had multiplied greatly in the land of Egypt. Over 400 years they spent there in slavery.
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And they multiplied greatly and God through Moses brought them out. They conquered the land that God had promised to them.
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Which is modern day Israel today. But in the promise to conquer, they didn't fulfill their part of the covenant.
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And so they left some of these warring tribes and some of the Canaanites there. And they were constantly a thorn in the side of Israel.
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You might recognize some of the names. The Philistines, the Amalekites, the Canaanites. All of these ites.
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These people groups that they didn't eradicate, they didn't remove them completely as God had said. And by the way I was reading in my quiet time this week.
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And you go, wait God told them to eradicate a people. Actually in Deuteronomy it says, and I read it I think yesterday in my quiet time.
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Where God says, it is not because you are righteous that I'm calling you to eradicate these people. It's because they are unreasonably wicked.
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The people, these ites, these Canaanites were unreasonably wicked. Even to the point of sacrificing their own children on altars.
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That's the kind of stuff that was going on during this era. So he says, wipe them clean and come and take the land. They didn't.
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They refused. And so in that refusing, God raised up judges. So you had
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Israel was supposed to be occupying the land. He would, the Philistines would pressure them and start to attack them.
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And he would raise up a judge and kick the Philistines back a bit. And so that's the context in which
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Samuel is called as a prophet of God. And they don't have a king yet. So they're ruled by these judges who
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God raises up for a time. And then they're subjugated again. The Philistines get the upper hand. And then they get the upper hand under a judge.
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And then there's peace for a period of time. And then another group, the Amalekites, press in or something like that. And so God calls
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Samuel to this context. And then the people demand a king.
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And so they look with their eyes and they say, This guy, Saul, looks awesome.
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He's like head and shoulders taller than anybody else. He's a manly man. He's tough. He looks rugged.
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We'll make him king. And God says, You're going to be sad and sorry that you asked for a king, but I'll give you what you want.
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And Saul proved to be a man who was not after God's own heart. And he took the nation in the wrong direction.
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And so God said, I'm going to raise up one who's going to take the throne who is a man after my own heart,
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Saul. This is going to be taken from you, and I'm going to give the kingship to somebody else. And already when we encounter the first chapter of 2
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Samuel, David has already been anointed as king in his youth. Samuel, the prophet
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Samuel, already went to David and anointed him with oil and said, You are the one, you are the chosen one.
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So he already knows that. But then Saul, of course, in his anger, wanted to kill
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David, so he chased him all over the countryside. And that brings us up to kind of where we're at today. Saul has died at the end of 1
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Samuel. 1 Samuel is all about the poor reign of King Saul. He's dead.
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Now how is David going to reign? And that's what we're going to be looking at. So our text this morning picks up right where we left off in 1
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Samuel back in 2018. Chapter 30 of 1 Samuel has David losing everything at a place called
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Ziklag. I'll explain that a little bit more later. But David lost everything. That's the last thing that occurred in history prior to the verses that we're going to read this morning.
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And then chapter 31 recounted the death of King Saul who died by suicide on the battlefield where he was fighting against the
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Philistines. A very bad death. So this opening text may seem strange in the flow of events, but it has a very important role in the narrative.
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David had absolutely no role in the death of the previous king. And here in chapter 1 we're beginning to establish or see the establishment of the reign of good
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King David. And it is vital for the historians and those who are recording these accounts to acknowledge that David did not lead a coup against King Saul.
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He didn't take the throne. He did not take the crown by force. He did not come in and lead a coup against and put to death
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King Saul. He had many opportunities recorded for us in the pages of 1
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Samuel to dispatch the wicked King Saul who was pursuing him and trying to put him to death.
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But he would not stretch out his hand to smite the anointed one of God. And where we find David here at the start of our text is in a very providential place.
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God orchestrating and organizing events. How many of you have just acknowledged that God has orchestrated some events in your life?
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And you can look and you can see those things where God has been moving in your history. Well, David is in a place where he's been living among the enemies of his people.
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He's been living among the Philistines. He's been living in the place where the enemies of Israel reside.
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He's been given a city to rule in the southern edges of the Philistine territory. And the city of Ziklag is the name of his town, his hometown where he's living at this time, where he's kind of tricked the
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Philistines into thinking that he has persona non grata in Israel. Nobody in Israel loves me. And therefore,
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I am now fully, basically a turncoat. He's basically saying, I'm basically equal to a
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Philistine in Saul's eyes. I'm just like one of you. And they accept him. So the city of Ziklag represents a phase in the life of David of apathy and self -preservation.
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David moved to Ziklag out of fear of King Saul. And in this sense, Ziklag represents a place where David is not trusting in God.
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We encounter David at the start of 2 Samuel, not in a fabulous place, but being moved into a better place.
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David moved to Ziklag in an act of trusting his own plans to preserve and protect himself. Well, why do
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I say that, and how can I say that with confidence? Back in chapter 30 of 1 Samuel, God shattered
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Ziklag. While David was away with his men, a band of opportunistic Amalekites came in and captured all the women and children from his town.
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They burned his hometown to the ground where he was living at the time. And the point you need to understand for the start of 2
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Samuel before you read it is that David is at a place where he has literally no place to live at the start of our text.
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He has been restored to his pursuit of God through the ordeal of losing everything at Ziklag. And now we come to a text that shows
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God's perfect timing, God's providential working in the history of humanity. David has been shaken awake by tragedy, and three days later he receives the crown of Israel under really strange circumstances that we're going to read now.
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So if you're not already there, turn over to 2 Samuel. If you've got that scripture journal or a device or a Bible, turn over to 2
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Samuel. We'll read the first 16 verses or verse 1 through 16 of 2
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Samuel together. But recast this as God's holy word, a strange word that needs some explanation, but a word that has the power to get into our hearts.
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2 Samuel 1, 1 through 16. After the death of Saul, when David had returned from striking down the
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Amalekites, David remained two days in Ziklag. And on the third day, behold, a man came from Saul's camp with his clothes torn and dirt on his head.
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And when he came to David, he fell to the ground and paid homage. David said to him, where do you come from?
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And he said to him, I have escaped from the camp of Israel. And David said to him, how did it go?
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Tell me. And he answered, the people fled from the battle. And also many of the people have fallen and are dead.
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And Saul and his son Jonathan are dead. Then David said to the young man who told him, how do you know that Saul and his son
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Jonathan are dead? And the young man who told him said, by chance
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I happen to be on Mount Gilboa. And there was Saul leaning on his spear. And behold, the chariots and the horsemen were close upon him.
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And when he looked behind him, he saw me and called to me. And I answered him, here I am. And he said to me, who are you?
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And I answered him, I am an Amalekite. And he said to me, stand beside me and kill me. For anguish has seized me, and yet my life still lingers.
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So I stood beside him and killed him. Because I was sure that he could not live after he had fallen.
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And I took the crown that was on his head and the armlet that was on his arm. And I brought them here to my Lord. Then David took hold of his clothes and tore them.
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And so did all the men who were with him. And they mourned and wept and fasted until evening. For Saul and for Jonathan his son.
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And for the people of the Lord and for the house of Israel. Because they had fallen by the sword. And David said to the young man who told him, where do you come from?
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And he answered, I am a son of a sojourner, an Amalekite. David said to him, how is it that you were not afraid to put out your hand to destroy the
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Lord's anointed? Then David called one of his young men and said, go execute him.
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And he struck him down so that he died. And David said to him, your blood be on your head. For your own mouth has testified against you.
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Saying, I have killed the Lord's anointed. Let's pray.
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Father, I thank you so much for the way that you work in human history. And it's mysterious to us looking forward trying to figure out and discern your will.
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We stand here at the start of a new year. With some expectations on 2022.
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But no knowledge of what awaits us in the next five minutes. We are fragile.
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We are frail. We are finite. You are amazing. You are glorious. You are omnipresent, omniscient, and omnipotent.
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So Father, I pray that you would meet us in the pages of 2 Samuel. You would meet us in the pages of history.
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That as we have the benefit of being able to look back and seeing your providential hand working in history.
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In the people's lives who honored you and wanted to seek you. And wanted their heart to be after you.
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Father, I pray that you would help us to learn the lessons that we need to learn from this. Most importantly to trust you. Most importantly to lean on you for the future and faith.
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Because you have been so faithful and kind to us in the past. Most importantly shown through the sacrifice of your son
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Jesus Christ. And I pray that from that place of strength and that place of knowledge of the sacrifice of Christ.
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That we would sing praises to you now in this new year. For the first time together singing these praises before you.
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As your people gathered. Thank you for Recast Church. I thank you for this gathering here in 2022.
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I pray that you would continue to bless us. Be with all of those who are sick and are not able to be here today. Father, I pray that you would continue to bring healing and wholeness to us.
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Spiritually, emotionally, physically as well. We ask this in Jesus name. Amen. Well go ahead and be seated and get comfortable.
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And keep your Bibles open to 2 Samuel 1 -16. And I'm just really grateful for the band up here.
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And for the AV guys. How many of you are glad that we've got a team that leads us in worship. And people up there. Would you go ahead and just give them a hand.
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I'm grateful for the work that they put in. And the time and effort and all of that. And doing things that you don't want me doing.
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You don't want me leading the songs up here. You would have applauded louder if you had put up with one week of me leading.
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So I'm really grateful for these guys. But yeah, get comfortable.
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If at any time during the message you need to get up and get more. It looks like there's more donut holes back there. There's more coffee available. If you need to use the restrooms because of the coffee.
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Down the hallway on the left hand side. That's available for you down there as well. But keep your
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Bibles open as I said. Or your scripture journal. The 2 Samuel 1 -16. I think it's good for us to set the stage.
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And I did a little bit in the introduction. But I want to remind you again that David ended up in Ziklag. Back in 1
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Samuel 27 -1. If you have one of those scripture journals you can actually just glance back there. 1 Samuel 27 rather.
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1 Samuel 27 verse 1. David said this in his heart. The text tells us. 1
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Samuel 27 -1. Now I shall. David speaking. Now I shall perish one day at the hand of Saul. He's confident he was going to die.
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He was confident that Saul was going to take his life. There is nothing better for me. This is a pity party by David.
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There is nothing better for me than that I should escape to the land of the Philistines. Then Saul will despair of seeking me any longer within the borders of Israel.
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And I shall escape. I shall escape out of his hand. David had been promised prior to stating that in his heart.
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Prior to feeling those feelings and those thoughts. Saul pursuing his life. Saul wanting him dead.
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Saul who knows that he's going to be his successor. Fears him. Thinks that he's out to kill him.
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So Saul's like, I'll kill him first. Like that's the kind of stuff that happens with power dynamics in kings.
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How many of you know that a lot of kings end up not dying of natural causes? Did you know that?
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A lot of kings are taken out by the one who's coming after them. Saul feared that.
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And so David says, I'm going to perish. Saul's going to kill me. He's going to take me out.
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But God's already promised him he's going to be the next king of Israel. Either God is right and David will not die at the hands of Saul.
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Or David is right and Saul's going to kill him. But both can't be true. So David is off on this thought.
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He is demonstrating something about how he's feeling. Back in 1 Samuel chapter 27. David had been promised by God that he would be king over Israel.
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But this is a moment of faithlessness. His heart was given over to fear. His heart was given over to doubt in the promises of God.
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And so he moves to Ziklag. He moves among the Philistines to save his own skin.
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He says it himself. And so we find in verse 1 that David returned to Ziklag after recovering the wives and children that had been captured by the
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Amalekites. And this was around the same time that Saul died in battle with the Philistines in the north of Israel.
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So it took a courier from the battle 3 days to cover 100 miles from Mount Gilboa where Saul died to Ziklag where David was living.
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So a courier has to come from the battle. They didn't have email. He wasn't able to call ahead or anything like that. No cell phones.
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So he had to travel 100 miles and he covered it in 3 days. Now the unidentified man is a major character in our account here in these 16 verses.
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He shows up from the battlefield with his clothing torn. That was intentional. And dirt on his head.
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Often they would put ashes on their head. They would tear their clothing in a sign of mourning. Those were universal signs of mourning and humiliation.
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And that's exactly what's going on here. The courier immediately falls down at David's feet. It says in paid homage or in respect to him.
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He knows who he's going to meet. He knows that this is the guy who's supposed to be the next king. He wants to be the first one there.
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Anybody have any ideas why this courier might want to be the first one to talk to the new king? Curry some favor maybe?
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Get in on his good side right away? And so his condition would have keyed David off that he is not bringing good news.
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Torn and dirt on his head. He is in mourning. He is intentionally disheveled. And then he uses this word from where are you coming?
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And he says, I escaped in regard to the camp of Israel. I escaped from the encampment. David is well aware that the
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Philistines had gone off to fight a war against Israel. They were fighting over a narrow valley that formed a very important trade route that cut across the face of the central mountains of Israel.
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And a very key place of transportation and trade there to get from Assyria and Babylon down to Egypt.
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You had to go through that narrow valley, the Jezreel Valley, with Mount Gilboa on the eastern end of it down by the sea.
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So we already know what's happened. Back in chapter 31 of 1 Samuel, we read a couple of years ago about the death of King Saul and the victory of the
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Philistines over Israel. But remember that David doesn't know any of this yet. You've got to put yourself in the context of the characters and what's going on in the story at the time that we're hearing about it.
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So he doesn't even know yet that Saul has died. And up through verse 4, the courier is truthful.
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You need to understand that he begins telling the truth. He begins up through those first four verses.
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David asks about the battle. The courier tells him the straight truth. Many of the Israelites have fallen in death, in battle.
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And Saul and his son Jonathan are also dead. These are true statements. Now David would likely be in shock over this revelation.
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He knows that the Philistines have marched to battle against the Israelites. He knows that they are trying to conquer that valley in the north.
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He's been living among the Philistines. They asked him to muster for battle and ended up turning him away and saying, no, you might turn against us in the battle and take the side of the
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Israelites, so we're not going to let you go to battle with us. He knew all of this was going on. So David's probably shocked over this revelation and he presses in on this young courier, this young man.
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How do you know Saul and Jonathan are dead? And this is where the courier begins his lie in verse 6.
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He begins what amounts to a tragic lie. We don't need too much imagination to understand or think about why this
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Amalekite messenger might lie, but I find it ironic that he picks the wrong things to lie about.
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Of course, I'm being facetious. No lies are justified. But he's not even very creative. I think it would have been more wise for him to lie about his identity as an
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Amalekite, one of the sworn enemies of Israel. But liars are notorious for picking the wrong facts to deviate from, right?
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He doesn't really know what the repercussions of these lies are going to be in his life, but he is staking a lot on the hopes that he will receive significant advantages from David in the future due to his fictional account of the death of King Saul and his role in it.
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I believe that he had hoped that he would receive a position in David's kingdom. I think this man... How many of you would acknowledge that most lies have self -serving purposes?
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Most of them are for the purpose of some type of advantage in the person lying, and this is no different.
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This courier, this messenger comes to King David and lies for some perceived benefit or blessing that he might receive from the hands of the new king.
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He's delivering the crown. He's delivering the armlet. He is the one who took out
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David's opposition, so to speak, and he thinks he should be rewarded handsomely for it.
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We'll see that he gets no such reward, and quite contrary, of course. We already read the text, but he says he was lucky.
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His account? I was lucky. I just happened. And all the terminology there, is it in verse 6?
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The young man told him, and the young man told him, by chance,
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I happened to be on Mount Gilboa. Just by chance.
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And he's picked the wrong things to lie about. He says, I just happened to stumble upon King Saul.
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How many of you know it's probably pretty unlikely that you just accidentally ran into King Saul on the battlefield?
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It's probably pretty unlikely. I was just hanging out, kind of watching TV, and there Saul came through my living room, and I was like, what?
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And he was just there. I just happened to be there. What he was actually doing there, I want to be clear, what this courier, this messenger, this
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Amalekite, this enemy of the people of God, what he was actually doing there seems suspect from the start, and I think
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David would know it. He was likely an opportunist at best, who was looking for spoils before the battle was even finished.
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He's looking to plunder. He's looking what loot he can find, what spoils he can obtain. His loyalties were certainly not with the
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Israelites, as an Amalekite. And when I say this, this might mean nothing to you, but let me just clarify one thing that will help snap this into focus.
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The people of Israel are leaving Egypt in the Exodus. They're going out into the desert, into places they've never been before.
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They don't know they're about 600 ,000 strong. And the first people to attack them are the
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Amalekites, in the book of Exodus. The first people to ever fight against the people of Israel as the nation is leaving the
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Exodus. They've got all their children. They've got all their vulnerable. They've got all their aged people traveling with them, caravanning across the desert.
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And the Amalekites come against them because they see them, they're opportunistic raiders.
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That's what the Amalekites are known for, all throughout this era, all throughout this history. Whenever they're mentioned, they're always opportunistic killers.
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They're raiders, if you will, pirates, if you will. Are you getting a picture of what the word Amalekite would have meant in that time?
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And so he claimed to come across Saul leaning on his spear, and he was surrounded and being pressed by the chariots and the horsemen.
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Again, a fact, he's come from Mount Gilboa, a fact that David would see through right away.
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It's a huge gap in his lies when he talks about the chariots and the horsemen coming to bear against Mount Gilboa and there where Saul was.
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The chariots would not be able to come to bear up on those slopes, some pretty steep slopes up Mount Gilboa.
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It's quite likely that Saul took his last stand there precisely for the reason that it was more easily defensible against calvary and chariots.
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Horses would not be as useful in that terrain. And we know the truth is that only the archers had hopes of getting him, and it was actually the archers that did indeed incapacitate
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King Saul according to the true account in chapter 31 of 1 Samuel.
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Further, the gaps in the lies are growing. In verse 7, King Saul would not be alone on the battlefield, but here this
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Amalekite courier claims to have a private conversation with King Saul that, of course, never happened unless he just talked to the body as he removed the crown and the armlet because by the time that he came to King Saul, King Saul had already taken his own life.
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The lie has King Saul calling over the Amalekite and asking him to put him out of his misery. Now, ironically, the truth is so close,
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I mean, the fiction here, the lie is so close to the truth of how Saul came to his end that it implies and what seems to be clear in the accounting is that the
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Amalekite actually observed what happened. He was there on the battlefield and he did actually observe the way that Saul died and he just twists the story to place himself in the middle of it.
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So, he probably saw what transpired between Saul and his armor bearer, Saul, who had been pierced through with arrows according to chapter 31 of the last book, pierced through with arrows, incapacitated, unable to get off the battlefield, surrounded and they were coming for him, the archers, of course, who had shot at him, knew his location and were coming for him and so he looked over at his armor bearer and said, kill me, put me out of my misery, don't let me fall into the hands of them, they are notorious torturers, this is going to go very poorly for me and in his last act of trust, faithlessness before God, he asked the armor bearer to kill him, the armor bearer refuses,
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Saul falls on his own sword and dies and so does his armor bearer. That's when the Amalekite comes into the scene.
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The Amalekite shows up and probably was already observing this circumstance happen and the ultimate twist in the lie is that he says that Saul asked him and he claims to have obliged the request of King Saul and have killed him.
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In verse 10 he says, so I stood beside him, he says, King Saul talked with me and said, kill me, so I did.
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And here we discover the last name of the Amalekite, apparently his last name must have been Kevorkian or something like that, so he says,
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I put him out of his misery. And so, a couple, thanks Ryman, we practice this in advance so that I get at least some laughs, not really.
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So this is the story of how the Amalekite courier came into the possession, he says, this is how I got the crown, look, here's the crown, here's the armlet of the
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King of Israel. And of course, identifiable marks that he did indeed see
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Saul. He was indeed there at the battle, he does indeed have the crown, he does indeed have the armlet.
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And what's so much more likely is that he didn't get this the way that he said he did, he was slinking around the battlefield, was lucky enough, as he said, lucky enough to be at the place where King Saul fell on his own sword and was able to get the crown and the armlet before the archer who killed him, who killed
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Saul or actually incapacitated him, could get to the Amalekite. The Amalekite escaped the battlefield and I would suggest to you that often truth is stranger than fiction, right?
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The fact that this guy could be on the battlefield and escape and get away with the crown and the armlet is amazing in and of itself.
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But David's initial reaction when he is convinced that Saul is dead, which probably he wasn't convinced until he actually saw the crown, saw the armlet, the first thing for him is to enter a state of deep grief and mourning.
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Now how many of you, if you know anything about the life of Saul, might expect David to celebrate at this moment?
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Like if you're a student of the Bible, if you go back and you read 1 Samuel and I think many of us would be tempted to go, whoo, the guy's gone.
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He chased him his entire life, tried to kill him his entire life, didn't want anything to do with him, was intimidated by him, thought he was after his power and his authority and acted like a complete tyrant and tried to pin
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David to the wall with a spear multiple times. Really attempted to kill his own son because his own son spoke highly of David.
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Saul was a little off his rocker here. And so David enters into a time of deep mourning.
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The tearing of the clothing, it was a sign of significant mourning and it was connected to the outer expression of an inner poverty.
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Now I actually read kind of an academic journal about the idea of tearing clothing.
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What is that about? How many of you see that in Scripture and you're like, why in the world would they rip their own shirt? What's that got to do with anything?
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Well, it was a significant sign of what was going on in their heart to externally show that.
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It's a way of saying life as I know it, a summary statement of the meaning of that in the ancient
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Near East was life as I know it has ended. The value of clothing was significant and comes to play here.
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The idea that people didn't have a closet full of clothing. Do you understand that? People didn't have a closet.
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They didn't have walk -in closets. Most people had a, maybe a wealthy person would have a couple of changes of clothing.
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The average person would have some clothing that they had to wash regularly just to stay clothed.
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So to tear that was a significant loss to the individual. Then there's humiliation in walking around in torn clothing.
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And there's the risk, of course, of tearing too far which would cause exposure which was all that was at play in the idea of tearing your clothing.
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The one who tears their clothing in mourning is publicly displaying that they are at the end of themselves.
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David and his men show in this act a deep and significant concern for Israel. Now it might be surprising for you guys to understand and hear that this mourning of David and his men is the literary center of our text this morning.
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It's the main point. It is simple but a profound thing that God is doing in the heart of his chosen leader here.
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He is reengaging David's heart for his people in this text. His season away in his own ziklag is coming to an end.
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And his heart is being drawn into sorrow and grief over the plight of the people that God is calling him to serve as king.
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Now if we're genuinely called to serve a people, we will equally be called to feel over them as well.
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He is mourning the loss of Saul. He is mourning the loss of his best friend
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Jonathan and also the loss of many of the people that he has been called to lead.
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So David and his men mourned and they wept and they fasted until evening. David has had a rough few days and I want to recap this last few days so that you understand where are we finding this king here at the start of this study.
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A few days before this, he crested a hill on his way home with all of his men to find his hometown of Ziklag a smoldering ruin.
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They quickly went through all of the rubble to find the dead and found none because every single woman and child in all of their families had been captured by the
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Amalekites. He then sought God's guidance for the first time in many, many recorded chapters.
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He seeks God in that moment. All of this Ziklag time has been a time of self -serving, a time of trying to save his own skin, a time of gathering around himself.
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It even says in the text, he gathered around himself all the unsavory individuals during the season of life. He lied to the
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Philistines during this time. It's not been going well for him. He has not been pursuing
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God, but in this circumstance, all the women and children gone, all of the houses burned, all of the loot gone, all of the flocks gone.
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He seeks God and says, what do I do? What do I do? The men want to kill me. They literally are talking about picking up stones and slaughtering me right here, right now.
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What do I do? This is all back in chapter 30 of 1 Samuel. They, under God's guidance, pursue and attack the large force of the
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Amalekites who have all of their wives and all of their children and all of their goods and all of their flocks.
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And they win under God's direction. They come back into Ziklag. They return to the ruins.
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And they were there for two days. Now, you've got to understand, the city was, according to chapter 30 of the last book, was burned to the ground.
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So what would staying in that place for two days be like? Staying in the ruins of your shelled out houses?
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I mean, they're there. They've got all their stuff. I mean, they're glad. Their wives are safe. Their kids are safe.
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It says they didn't lose a single life in this entire ordeal. They've got no place to sleep. They're sleeping in tents.
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They're trying to make makeshift lean -to's and all of that stuff. And going, what does rebuilding this place look like?
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And that's where he's at. For two days, on the third day, this courier shows up saying, a huge swath of the north of Israel has been lost to the
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Philistines. That key valley has fallen. And not only has it fallen, but many Israelites are dead, and Saul is dead, and your best friend
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Jonathan died in battle as well. How many of you know that there are some weeks that include more than we can bear?
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There are some weeks that include more than we can bear. There is no such thing as a promise from God that he won't give you more than you can bear.
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As a matter of fact, I'd suggest to you the opposite is true. He guarantees he'll give you more than you can bear. But you have to lean on him.
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And that's what's happened to David. He's received more than he can bear. He has to come back to God because all of the things that he was trusting in have left him.
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David's heart is one of mourning, but he also turns his attention with scrutiny to the messenger. I think
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David was no fool. It seems likely that he could see through some of the story and go, something's not lining up here. Instead, David doesn't attack the story, but instead he just merely asks for the identity of the individual.
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He says, wait a minute, who are you? Where are you coming from? He claims to be a second -generation immigrant to Israel from among the
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Amalekites. And just recently, remember, the Amalekites are the ones who sacked David's city of Ziklag.
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They burned it to the ground. They kidnapped all the wives and children. To identify himself as Amalekite here is not really, really good.
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If this Amalekite had seen everything that God had just done in the life of David, that would have been the last person he would...
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As long as he's lying, he might as well lie about his identity. Oh, no, no, I'm an Israelite too. I'm from the tribe of Simeon.
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And, yeah, on my grandmother's side, way distant back, but I'm an
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Israelite too. No, he's bold about it. So David's biggest concern in this story is how this foreigner, and this is key, church, how is this foreigner who claims to have lived among the
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Israelites his entire life? So his parents were foreigners. He's a second -generation Amalekite living among the
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Jews, he says. So if you were raised your entire life in Israel, says David, how is it that you were not afraid?
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Just let that pause for a second. How is it that you were not afraid? How is it that you were not afraid to put out your hand to kill the
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Lord's anointed? If you've been among our people for all of this time, how is it that you were not afraid of the
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Almighty God, the one who put his stamp of approval on King Saul?
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How is it that you didn't fear to slay that one? This question has echoes of significant application for us, and we're going to come back to it in a minute, but consider what
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David is asking, because it's really profound. How is it that you have so little regard, and he uses the personal name of God here,
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YHWH, Yahweh, sometimes pronounced Jehovah, not the generic word
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God, Elohim, but the personal revealed name of God to Moses, Yahweh.
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How is it that you were not afraid to put your hand against Yahweh's anointed?
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How is it possible that you've lived your whole life among the Israelites and still possess so little respect and awe for the calling of God Almighty that you would kill his anointed?
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In other words, I think David is saying here, I don't believe for a moment that you have been living among Israel. As a second generation
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Amalekite, there's no way, because surely you would have some respect for God were you truly living among us.
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What this Amalekite claims to have done, even Saul's own armor bearer, keep this in mind, even Saul's own armor bearer would not do.
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There's an amazing irony that Saul would not obey God's commands. His armor bearer wouldn't obey his final command.
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Run me through, the armor bearer says. No, you're on your own on that. I'm not going to put my hand against the Lord's anointed.
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And David, at the testimony of this Amalekite, that he has killed the king, shocking to our sensibilities, commanded one of his young soldiers to execute this messenger, and he does it on the spot.
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This messenger significantly misjudged the wishes and desires of King David. Do you see that? David clearly respected the calling and the anointing of Yahweh, the
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Lord, over his own rule and reign. He would never strike down the one
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God chose to lead. Remember, he had many chances, and he refused. And here, when a man testifies that he killed
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King Saul, he is put to death. Not merely for murder. Not merely for murdering the king.
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That would be enough. But he is executed for his lack of fear of the Lord of Israel.
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He should have known better. He should have feared God above all. I want to be careful as we pick through the text to see what
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God desires for us to take on as a result of this historical account. It's kind of careful picking in historical accounts like this.
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I want to be clear that all of Scripture is recorded for our training, for our understanding, for our correction, for our rebuke, to set us on the right path where we're thinking wrong.
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But nothing in Scripture is just purely history. We must be careful with simplistic moralisms, too, on the other hand.
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The text is rarely just act like David, and don't act like the Amalekite. Let's pray and close it.
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Let's close our time with three applications of this text to us. Tying this back to its immediate context,
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I want to point out the providential hand of God working in the life of King David at the end of 1
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Samuel and the start of 2 Samuel. The first application is simply this, church. I mean, I say simply.
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Simple statement. Takes a lifetime to do. Trust God. God is working
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His plan through the good and bad of your life. God's providential hand in our lives is much easier seen in the rearview mirror.
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Do you get what I mean by that? A lot easier to see looking backwards, right? I had you do this earlier, but how many of you could raise your hand and say,
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I can see God's hand in my past. I can see the way that He worked circumstances and brought me to the place where He wanted me to be.
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I can see that in the past. But how many of you are looking out the windshield? It's a little trickier to see.
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How many of you would love it if it would be as clear out there as it is in that rearview mirror? I wish it was, but it's not.
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The problem is we misunderstand and think that understanding God's providence is about the future.
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That it's about how I work and move. What's my next decision? Where should I go to college? Who should I marry?
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What should I do next? Should I switch my job? Should I move houses? Should I buy a new car? All of those kinds of things.
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When what God is most concerned with is that you trust Him with your future. Why? Because He's proven
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Himself faithful in your past. Own that rearview mirror.
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Rehearse that rearview mirror. Look at it and love God and trust
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God who has work to bring you through. Amen? It's all about looking back at the way...
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That's what this whole Old Testament is. A look back at God's faithfulness to accomplish
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His will and His good plans. Even through hard weeks like this one in David's life.
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From the big picture of God's sovereign rule in history, God was bringing David to the throne.
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But from David's perspective, this was a devastating week, right? What do you think? That to walk in David's shoes that week would be tough.
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It would be really tough. But God is moving and working.
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God is bringing him to the throne that He promised to David. Think about it.
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This account is how David comes to possess the royal crown and royal armlet of Israel.
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This is how he comes into the crown. Weird circumstances? Yeah. Providential circumstances?
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Absolutely. So as far as application, the practical calling first from this text is to trust
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God with the twists and turns of your life. Our lives are not, as we might tend to think, random assortments of good and bad experiences all slammed in a mixer and ground up.
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For those who belong to God through faith in Jesus Christ, we are told that He's working all things out for our good.
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For those who love Him and are called according to His purposes. Trust Him in good times and also trust
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Him when the days are dark as well. The second thing is, I don't know exactly how to term this, so I put let
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God wake you up and then I changed it, but the slides were already up and I wasn't going to be able to change that. It sounds a little strange, like let
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God wake you up. How many of you know that God will shake things to get your attention from time to time? How you respond to that varies.
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Do you get what I mean by that? Sometimes He shakes you and you go, oh yeah, yeah, that was like September 11th.
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How many of you were shaken a bit at September 11th? Our whole nation was shaken. Two months later they're back to business as usual.
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He didn't wake us up, it just kind of got us to go to church a little bit. You get what I'm saying in that?
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When I say let God wake you up, I mean like that. Acknowledge God is doing something in your circumstances and then honor
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Him in it. David has been brought back into concern and care for others through this just radical, difficult week that he's gone through.
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Maybe God would use this account to wake some of us up just as we've read it and studied it and look and say, okay,
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God sometimes brings people to rock bottom. They got no house left and then we wake up to understanding.
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David is found in Ziklag, the start of the text, living among the Philistines. He was afraid that Saul was going to kill him.
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Afraid that COVID was going to kill him. Afraid that something was going to kill him. You can put it wherever you are at.
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So he took matters into his own hands and he left his people. He left his people behind.
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And I would suggest to you that we also have received our share of temptations to withdraw into ourselves this past couple of years.
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Anybody feel it? No matter how you view this pandemic, I would tell you,
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I tried my best to keep a fairly midline attitude towards this. I don't deny that it exists, nor do
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I believe that it should drive everything in my life. But I can tell you this for sure. I am more introverted now than I was two years ago.
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Anybody with me on that? I have more focus on myself than I ever have in 48 years right now.
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It's a confession. And I don't know how you got through this without that. Maybe some of you could share your secrets with me about how you're not more self -focused than you were two years ago, but my hunch is that all of you are.
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I think all of us experienced that. Well, David needed to be shaken awake before he was going to really be used by God to lead the people as king.
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Now certainly none of us are being called to a kingship over a nation, that I know of. But all of us indeed are being called by God to serve others.
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That's one thing I know for sure. To a person in this room, all of us have a gift, all of us have an ability to give and to serve others.
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David had to lose everything and have it restored before reawakening to his calling. Let God wake you up to serving him.
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Honestly, take some time to consider if you are caught in the same rut as David here. Self -preservation and controlling circumstances to try to get your outcomes.
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Taking care of himself with little to no concern for those he was called to lead. Ziklag was a place of David seeking to save himself.
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And I suggest to you, I warn you, God is faithful to remove those things that his children trust in more than him.
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He's faithful to remove the things, faithful to remove the things that we put our trust in more than him.
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If we belong to him. If we don't, he might just be happy to leave us in it. The third thing is lastly, fear
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God enough to honor him. We're getting ready to take communion together in a moment and that's a celebration of the work that God has already done for us to secure our salvation.
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But the reality of our salvation is never meant, hear me carefully church, is never meant to demotivate us from reverent awe and fear of the almighty creator.
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It's never to make us flippant about sin. Notice that David in verse 14 highlights the main error of the
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Amalekite. What was his main error? How is it that you were not afraid? Is there room for fear in this?
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Absolutely. How is it that you were not afraid of the right thing to fear?
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How is it that you were not afraid to strike down the Lord's anointed? This Amalekite's disrespect for the
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Lord almighty found him. He was exposed in his own story and even as he tells lies, he incorporated disrespect for God in his own lies.
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How will our sins be seen? How will they be found? How is it that you were not afraid to abuse the one made in the image of God by treating her like an object on the screen of your phone?
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How is it that you were not afraid to pass along that gossip that you know that God would not approve of?
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How is it that you were not afraid to speak to your wife that way? How is it that you were not afraid?
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How is it that you don't tremble before the holiness of God? How is it that I do that?
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Unless you think that I'm over -applying something from the Old Testament and kind of just running off with it, it could equally have been stated by Peter at the death of Ananias and Sapphira in the
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New Testament book of Acts, how is it that you were not afraid to lie about how much you gave to the church?
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And they die. It is sin that should evoke the fear of Yahweh in our hearts, the fear of our
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Lord. We celebrate the forgiveness of our sins through the death of Jesus Christ, those sins that are mortal, those sins that will bring us to hell without the grace of God.
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How much more should we celebrate today? How much more should we celebrate the grace and the forgiveness that we have in Christ as we recognize how any single one of our sins is condemnable?
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You feel it? And yet there is grace. Grace for us?
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Grace for a sinner like me? Wow. We celebrate the forgiveness of our sins through the death of Jesus Christ, but we still acknowledge that God calls sinners to sanctification.
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He wants us to walk closer to Him in 2022 than we did in 2021. He calls us to a loving obedience of Him out of love for Him, not out of just strict, straight obedience that we hate, but because we love
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Him and we want to honor Him. Where we have no desire to honor Him like this Amalekite, we should have fear of the judgment of God.
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If we belong to Him, we will despise and hate our sin. We will want to obey, even in those situations where we fall short.
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We will make plans to block and fight sin in our own hearts. So we rejoice this morning the sacrifice has been made to cover our sins for those times when we fall short.
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And if you belong to Jesus, then please go to the tables and take the cracker and the juice to remind yourself. It's intentionally a reminder.
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You're supposed to be remembering something when you take that, not just stand in line and quickly back to your seats and take some juice and a cracker, a snack time.
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It is a reminder that Jesus died, His body broken in your place for your sin.
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His blood shed in our place for our sins. And then rejoice, church, that He has made a way for unrighteous sinners and ungodly sinners like us to be restored to Him.
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But if you've not asked Jesus to set you free from your sins, then I encourage you to come and talk with me after the service.
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It's a simple conversation. I don't bite and I won't yell. But I would love to talk with you about how you can start a fresh new relationship with Jesus Christ and be forgiven of your sins.
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And let's all leave this place considering that God is working His big picture plan. We can trust
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Him. Let God wake you up to the ministry He has called you to and gifted you to and allow fear to accompany temptations to sin in your life.
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Don't allow the glorious grace of Christ to be abused as an excuse to sin. Let's pray.
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Father, I thank you here at the start trying to get caught up on the history and trying to connect with your work in the life of King David.
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I pray, Father, that you would allow where there was truth in this message that you desire to press down into the hearts of individuals here that you would speak that.
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Continue to allow this message to produce fruit in people's lives.
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Father, I thank you for the grace that we have in Christ. But I also acknowledge that it is so open to our abuse that we may find ourselves in a state where we no longer have an appropriate fear that honors you in terms of how serious and significant our sin is.
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Father, I pray that you would help us wherever we see it in our lives by your grace and by your mercy and the power of your
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Spirit to love you more than our sin. Father, I pray that you would help us to trust you with the twists and turns of life.
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We've had a chance over the last few days hopefully to think about last year and now we reflect on what's coming for us in this next year.
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And we are blind, just like normal. We don't know what the next day, the next week, the next year holds for us.
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But we know you are walking with us in it. And so, Father, I pray that we would trust you. You have been so faithful in our past.