Life of David — Alan Redpath

And the life of David as given by Dr. Alan Redpath.

Two Scotsmen and two Irishmen and two Englishmen who were lost on a desert island, cast up on a desert island for six months, and eventually they were discovered, rescued. And when they were rescued the two Scotsmen were discussing the possibility of home rule for Scotland and the two Scotsmen were singing and the two Irishmen were fighting, but the two Englishmen weren't speaking to each other because they hadn't been introduced.

If we had put up partitions, however, I'm sure it's going to be very wonderful for you. Partitions or no partitions, hallelujah anyway. Well now, will you turn with me this morning for our closing message to 1 Chronicles chapter 21.

David’s Sin and the Angel of Judgment

1 Chronicles chapter 21. And, well we'll make references to different parts of the chapter in the message, but we'll read from verse 16. 1 Chronicles 21, 16. And David lifted up his eyes and saw the angel of the Lord stand between the earth and the heavens, having a drawn sword in his hand, stretched out over Jerusalem.

Then David and the elders of Israel, who were clothed in sackcloth, fell upon their faces. And David said unto God, Is it not I that commanded the people to be numbered? Even I it is that have sinned and done evil indeed, but as for these sheep, what have they done?

Let thine hand, I pray thee, O Lord my God, be on me and on my father's house, but not on thy people, that they should be plagued. Then the angel of the Lord commanded Gad to say to David that David should go up and set up an altar unto the Lord in the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

And David went up at the saying of Gad, which he spake in the name of the Lord. And Ornan turned back and saw the angel, and his four sons with him hid themselves. Now Ornan was threshing wheat, and as David came to Ornan, Ornan looked and saw David, and went out of the threshing floor and bowed himself to David with his face to the ground.

Then David said to Ornan, Grant me the place of this threshing floor, that I may build an altar therein unto the Lord. Thou shalt grant it me for the full price, that the plague may be stayed from the people.

And Ornan said unto David, Take it to thee, and let my Lord the King do that which is good in his eyes. Lo, I give thee the oxen also for burnt offerings, and the threshing instrument for wood, and the wheat for the meat offering.

I give it all. And King David said to Ornan, Nay, but I will verily buy it for the full price, for I will not take that which is thine for the Lord, nor offer burnt offerings without cost. So David gave to Ornan for the place six hundred shekels of gold by weight.

And David built there an altar unto the Lord, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings, and called upon the Lord. And he answered him from heaven by fire upon the altar of burnt offerings. And the Lord commanded the angel, and he put up his sword again into the sheath thereof.

Shall we look to God just in a moment of prayer? Shall we repeat together the prayer that we have offered each morning and evening? Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth. Speak just now, some message to meet my need, which thou only dost know.

Speak now through thy holy word, and make me see some wonderful truth thou hast to show to me for Jesus' sake. ...saying about the closing message of this series, I have been concerned that in the ministry of the week, as we have been seeking to present to you the life that is available to us in the Lord Jesus, I have been concerned lest we have in any sense failed to present to you the real issue which faces all of us if we would enter into such a life.

And the message in song to which we have just listened has concerned in my heart the word that should be spoken in the name of the Lord here this morning. For for how many years I personally wandered away from God because I failed to face the issue that I want to present to you today.

You notice the 26th verse of this chapter, the last phrase, the Lord answered David from heaven by fire upon the altar of the burnt offering. As Satan hurls fiery darts at the child of God, the only resistance that's victorious, the only answer is fire from heaven.

The only way to prevail over the fire from hell is fire from God. And these closing verses, words of this verse, are just an Old Testament illustration of this. We have moved quite a long way along in the life of David now.

We've passed by some incidents which have been distressing, things which have been sad, things which have been sinful. And the closing days of David's life will live under the sense of a cloud. You see, God never makes it impossible for a Christian to sin.

Never. He always makes it possible for him not to. But he never makes it impossible for a child of God to sin. And as we move along in David's life now, we are coming to days that are days of problem for him and difficulty, days of testing.

And this chapter records one of them. Because in the opening portion, which we read together in the 16th verse, if you refer back to this for a moment, David lifted up his eyes and saw the angel of the Lord stand between the earth and the heaven, having a drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem.

Here is this man off to God's own hearts, facing quite a different kind of pressure now. We've been thinking of him in previous mornings under the pressure of the enemy. But now he's under the pressure from heaven.

We've been thinking of him standing in the will of God, learning some wonderful lessons in the course of his training for the purpose which God had in mind for him. And we've been thinking of him in times of victory and times of testing and times when all the pressures of the powers of darkness were simply flinging everything at him.

But now David is under pressure from heaven. The sword of the Lord is drawn against him. This is not pressure from hell, but it's the chastening of God. I'm so glad that the Bible says, whom the Lord loves he chastens.

Not whom the Lord hates, but whom the Lord loves. And here's a man whom God loves, whom God is chastening. And he's chastening him because of his sin. Here in this area, in this land, where God had purposed a Bethlehem, a Calvary, and a Pentecost.

Here in this area, a man of God, through whom that purpose was going to be fulfilled, has sinned. And the sword of the Lord is against him in judgment. I wonder if it could be true of your life today, that in the area of your heart where God has planned for you a Bethlehem, where the Lord Jesus should be incarnate in you by the Holy Spirit, and he's planned for you a Calvary, where you might learn to guide yourself, that you might live under God.

And therefore he's planned for you a personal Pentecost. In the territory of your soul there has been controversy with God. And because of this, perhaps not only for the days of this week when it has been exposed, and when maybe some of you have been fighting real battles with God, but perhaps for weeks and months and even years there's been controversy between you and heaven, and God has turned on the pressure.

Disobedience and Unbelief as the Roots of David’s Sin

The opening verses of this chapter are phenomenal sound about them. Satan, this is how the chapter begins, Satan stood up against Israel and provoked David to number Israel. You might think that that's a very minor item for God to be disturbed about, that David should number the people.

Not at all. It involved two principles which are basic. One, the principle of disobedience, and two, the principle of unbelief. And these are the very things that make it impossible for God to bless a man.

These are the very things that drive him away, that sever our fellowship. This is the thing which drove the human race from God in the beginning of all history. It's the thing that keeps men from God now.

And it's the worst of all sins in the fight of heaven, when a child of God disobeys and disbelieves. Satan stood up against Israel to provoke David. Again you notice that Satan has stood up to provoke the leader, the captain, the king.

And Satan has struck again at the heart. And David, in spite of Joab's remonstrance, has failed. And so there's controversy now raging in David's heart, because he's conscious that from that moment on the sword of the Lord is drawn against him.

A man can go through anything of the fiery attack of the devil if he knows things are right with God. But if he's fighting a battle in his own soul and he knows that the Lord is against him, something's going to happen.

And as David fought that battle with God, he learned two things about sin. And this was why God chastised him till he learned these two things. He learned in the first place that a man of God, when he sins, finds himself involved in the consequences of his sins.

The Temporal Consequences of Sin

Look at verse 10. The Lord spake to Gad, God tell David, saying, Thus saith the Lord, I offer thee three things. Choose thee one of them, that I may do it unto thee. So Gad came to David and said unto him, Thus saith the Lord, choose thee either three years' famine, three months to be destroyed before thy foes, while that the sword of thine enemy overtaken thee, or else three days the sword of the Lord, even pestilence in the land, and the angel of the Lord destroying throughout all the coast of Israel.

Now therefore advise thyself what word I shall bring again to him that sent me. What a desperate moment it must have been in that man's life when he heard that word from heaven. David has sinned, and because of his sin he's made his bed and he's going to have to lie on it, and he's going to suffer the consequences.

And God gives him a choice. Three years' famine, three months to be destroyed by your enemy, three days in the hand of the Lord. When a man of God sins, the eternal consequences of that sin are covered by the precious blood of Christ.

But the temporal consequences of the sin have to be taken. Have you understood that? If a man sins and he doesn't suffer the chastisement of heaven for his sin, and he successfully covers up and gets away with it, it only proves that he isn't a Christian at all.

Have I scripture authority for that? I have. Would you mind turning with me a moment to the epistle to the Hebrews in the twelfth chapter. Hebrews chapter 12. And let me read these solemn words to you this morning.

Hebrews 12, verse 6. For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If he and you are chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons. For what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not?

But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards and not sons. That's strong language. In other words, if a man falls into sin and successfully covers up, and doesn't know the chastisement of God, it's only a proof that he's not a man of God at all.

But if a man is a Christian, and he knows the Lord, and he's tripped up by the enemy, the word of God will come to him as it came to David. I give you my choice. It won't come, of course, in these words, with these things, with these statements.

But he will discover that though the eternal consequences are covered by the blood, the temporal consequences of his folly and of his evil come back onto his own head. Three years' famine, three months in the hand of your enemy, three days in the hand of God.

And you notice what David said, verse 13. I am in a great strain. Let me fall now into the hand of the Lord, for very great are his mercies, but let me not fall into the hand of men. Lord, if I've sinned, and I have to take the consequences of it, and this demands exposure, and it demands suffering, and it demands chastisement, Lord, please, don't let me fall into the hand of men.

For very largely today, though the Christian church has a gospel for the unbeliever of mercy, it has no gospel of mercy for the saint who has been tripped up. It has a gospel of forgiveness for the man who is unsaved, but it has no forgiveness for the believer who has fallen.

Therefore, Lord, don't let me fall into the hand of men, but I want to be in thy wounded hand. It's the only safe place, and I'll take what you say I must go through. David found that sin has consequences.

Brother, sister, when you are tempted, remember that. No Christian sins and gets away with it. And then David learned the second lesson about sin, that sin is a community affair. Nobody sins alone. Verse 17.

Sin’s Effect on the Community

David said unto God, Lord, is it not I that commanded the people to be numbered? Even I it is that have sinned and done evil indeed. But as for these sheep, what have they done? Let thy hand, I pray thee, O Lord my God, be on me and on my father's house, but not on thy people, that they should be plagued.

You know what has happened. David has sinned. And the consequences of this sin involve not only himself, but his whole army, as he sees other people suffering for his own crime. When a man of God sins, there's nothing so desperate and so humiliating and so awful as to watch the consequences in the lives of other people.

As a preacher of the gospel, he begins to discover that his church prayer meeting goes to pieces. And he finds that his congregation themselves, spiritually, go to pieces also. And very often he finds the sin that he's committed being repeated in the lives of his people.

And he discovers that the whole community, the whole fellowship in which he is involved, is suffering and being punished in the chastisement of God because of his own sin. You're a member of your missionary fellowship?

You're a member of a little prayer group? You have a responsibility for teaching a class? You're involved in some spiritual assignment and responsibility? Have you seen that fall apart recently? Have you seen the spiritual temperature drop?

Have you seen a stop and an end to any evident blessing? Have you seen a hold-up? Have you seen other people getting worldly? Have you said to yourself, and have you joined a little group in prayer for praying for other people who are spiritually losing out and all the time in your own heart?

Hasn't God been saying to you, why are they going like that? You see what I mean? Sin is never isolated. And very often it's the last person in the world that we would desire to be affected by, is the very one who suffers in chastisement.

Repentance Under the Pressure of Heaven

David made two discoveries, and this was the pressure of the Lord upon him. And the sword of the Lord was drawn against him until, until he could stand it no longer, and in the 16th verse we find David and the elders of Israel clothed in backlog fell upon their face.

This week will have been absolutely in vain, and a sheer waste of time, unless it has brought somebody in this building to that moment. Where you have just fallen on your face before God, like David did, in absolute, utter, complete.

Repentance, to which David yielded. Oh friends, I wonder how long in your life there's been.

This controversy with heaven, and God has put the pressure on from this angle and the other, and you've been listening to me talk about the pressure of the enemy and all the time you've known that the pressure in your life is not from Satan, it's from heaven.

And God has had this issue with you and controversy with you, and he won't let go, and he keeps on and on, and he pushes you into a corner, and he pushes you there, and seeks to keep you there, and you cover up and run away and try to escape, and God is after you, and the sword of the Lord is drawn against you in judgment, and you have discovered that sin has had its consequences in your own life, and the tragedy of it is it's had its consequences in other people's lives too.

The pressure to which David yielded. But oh, what an evidence it is that he loves you, what an evidence it is that he cares for you, what an evidence it is that he still desires that in your life and through it there should be a Bethlehem and a Calvary and a Pentateuch.

And will you notice therefore, please, not only the pressure to which David yielded, but the price which David paid? Verse 24, King David said to Ornan, Nay, but I will verily buy it for the full price, for I will not take that which is thine for the Lord, nor offer burnt offerings without cost.

Worship and the Cost of the Altar

What has happened? This tremendous moment of humbling in David's life has to be followed by worship. Verse 18 tells us that the angel of the Lord commanded Gad to say to David that David should go up and set up an altar unto the Lord in the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

In other words, this tremendous moment in David's life in which he fell upon his face before God had to be marked out in his memory that he would never forget. A moment when he's met with God, and God has dealt with him, and controversy has been ended, and the pressure from heaven has been too much for him, and David has given in, and so this is going to be a milestone, and there's going to be erected an altar there.

This place of humbling has to be a place of worship, a place that David would ever remember, and never forget for less. And an altar was to be raised in the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. And the story tells us that as David proceeds to obey God on this matter, Ornan meets him, very afraid of what's taking place, afraid of the angels' presence, and offers to David the oxen and the wood and the floor and everything for sacrifice, and he says to David, take it, you can have it for nothing, I'll give it to you free.

But David's answer was, no, I'll buy it for the full price, I will not take that which is thine for the Lord, nor will I offer a burnt offering without cost. Where did this happen? I wonder how many of you could answer me that question from your knowledge of the Bible.

Where did this incident happen? I'll tell you where it happened. It happened on Mount Moriah. 2 Chronicles chapter 3 and verse 1 tells us that. What does Mount Moriah convey to your mind? What impression does that register?

Mount Moriah? What's that mean? In my Bible I find that Mount Moriah is always the place of sacrifice. It's always associated with cost, with a price that was paid to the very limit. It was in Mount Moriah, on Mount Moriah rather, that Abraham offered Isaac, and gave all he had.

It was on Mount Moriah here that David offers his burnt offering. It's on Mount Moriah that Solomon built his temple. It was there that Satan took Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple, and offered him the kingdoms of this world without price.

Mount Moriah. It's always a place in the Bible where the price was paid. And it's always the place where the devil comes to you and suggests an easy way out. Like Ornan came to this. Don't, don't pay this price, don't go to this limit, don't make this sacrifice, let me give it to you, let me make it easy for you.

And Satan is always concerned when the sword of the Lord is drawn against a man of God in judgment. He's always concerned to ensure that that condition exists and continues, because as long as there's controversy between God and you, there is no unction from heaven, and authority in your life.

And Satan's perfectly happy if that can continue. And Satan, who knows all about it, just as the Lord knows all about it, knows perfectly well the issue in our lives which so often God has challenged us about, and we've refused to face.

And therefore at the moment when God has been speaking, and the pressure from heaven has been put upon us, and the sword of the Lord has gone deep, and it's full of oneself, and Satan is right alongside now, he says, you deal with this and that, and get right here and that, but not this.

Herod’s Rejection of Christ’s Voice

There's one individual whose story in the New Testament always fills me with a sense of dread, because as far as I can tell he's the only person in the Bible to whom Jesus had never a word to say. They only met once, just a few hours before the crucifixion, and this man, a king, his name Herod, asked Jesus many things, many questions, and Jesus answered him nothing.

I wish that you'd let that sink into your heart. The Savior of the world, who'd come to redeem and to save and to deliver from sin, was face to face with a man who was asking him many questions, many things, and Christ hadn't a word to say.

Well word from the Lord, why surely it could have brought him salvation! It was too late. Too late? Oh yes, too late. Rebellion against God had gone on for too long. You know what had happened? Oh, just a year or two ago, that great forerunner of Christ, John of Aptos, that great man, the greatest preacher born among women, as was the testimony of the Savior to him, had dared to go into the home of this man Herod and confront him about his association with a woman with whom he was living, and said to him, you've no business to have that woman.

And you know what Herod did? He heard John of Aptos, like the common people heard Jesus, he heard him gladly, and the Scripture tells us that he did many things. Yes, I'm sure he did. Probably swore a bit less, drank a bit less, reformed his life, turned over a new leaf here and there.

Oh but listen to me young people, listen. Oh may the Lord just write this upon your heart and mine. One thing he refused to do was to give up the woman who ruined his life. That's all. And because the pressure of heaven was turned upon him about it, all he did was to put John in prison and ultimately murder him to get out of the way.

And so when he met Jesus for the first time, the Savior of the world was silent. That's a very solemn thing. I doubt whether I could say anything more solemn from a platform to your heart and to my own.

But there'll come a moment if we don't yield to the pressure of heaven, when the voice of heaven will stop speaking. My spirit will not always try. I trust that in your heart and life, the price which David paid, has been paid.

Mount Moriah, Self-Denial, and Full Surrender

You've been up Mount Calvary, and you've received his presence. You've been up Mount Olivet maybe, and you've seen him transfigured in the glory of the risen Lord. But have you been up Mount Moriah? There's an instrument that was used in Old Testament times by the priests, which you don't hear much about these days.

It was called the flesh hook. You know what it was used for? It was used to keep the sacrifice under the flame. And sometimes the Lord has to take the flesh hook and take the sacrifice which has sought to escape from the flame and bring it back again and put it under the flame, until that sacrifice is reduced to dust and ashes.

And that's all God wants of you, just to be dust and ashes, nothing. But he, upon the sight of your ruins, of your personal complete and absolute abandonment to him, might build the character of Jesus.

Have you to pray, Lord Jesus, take the flesh hook to my heart and life today, for the price being paid? Notice quickly, will you, the power which David received when he paid the price. And the Lord answered him from heaven by fire, upon, upon the altar of burnt offering.

What a tremendous verse that was, that is. Oh my, how God had longed to do that. How God longs to do that for you today. It's the immediate response of heaven to the uttermost surrender of my heart, and for the willingness to face the real issue in my life, the immediate response from heaven, is the fire of God's Holy Spirit.

He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire. John Wesley, Charles Wesley, used to speak of him in these languages, O thou who camest from above, the pure celestial fire to impart, kindle a flame of sacred love on the mean altar of my heart.

And again in this verse, do you remember it? Refining fire go through my heart, illuminate my soul, scatter thy light through every part, sanctify the whole. Oh friend, I think you've gathered this week, and I'm sure in your own hearts, many of you, I trust all of you believe this, that the salvation that God offers to us is not simply an escape from the penalty of sin.

It's not simply even a deliverance from the power of sin. Ah no. It's the fire of God's Spirit burning like the very flame of God in my heart, which takes away the love of sin. Do you mean to tell me that you and I have to go through 50, 60, 70 years of life with an awful hankering after sinful habits?

Always longing for the flesh pots of Egypt. Always with this awful downward pull, and this inward tug, and this drag down. Oh no, the Lord doesn't eradicate the old nature, but praise God by the inflow of the flame of God's Holy Spirit.

He deals it a resounding blow and keeps it in total subjection. The flame of God that can burn in my heart and in yours, and give you a passion for souls, and a cry to God for holiness, and a hatred of everything that grieves him.

This is not what may happen to your life, but this is what must happen to your life at the very moment when you're prepared to face the real issue. Therefore I would say to you, friend, listen. If during this week, or maybe some other time in your heart, God has put the pressure upon you, and the sword of the Lord has been drawn against you, and the pressure has been so overwhelming that like David, you've come on your faith before the Lord to worship him and to say, all right, Lord, whatever it costs, I yield.

What do you do then? I'll tell you what you do. In the name of the Lord, you step to the throne of heaven in your heart and you say, Lord, I claim, I claim thy promise. I claim my inheritance. I claim the fullness of thy blessing.

I claim the power of Pentecost. This is the answer, the answer of heaven to your uttermost abandonment, and it's for you to claim that answer right now. But there's just one other thing I want you to notice as I finish this sort of precious little postscript to this story.

The Peace of God After the Sword Is Sheathed

We've considered just very briefly today the pressure to which David has yielded, and the price which he's paid in his own heart, and the power which he now receives. The fire of God falling upon the burnt offering.

But do you notice the 27th verse of this chapter? The 27th verse, just look at it with me a moment, will you? And I have called it, The Peace Which David Enjoyed. The Peace Which David Enjoyed. Do you see what's happened?

The Lord commanded the angel, and he put up his sword again into the sheath thereof. My, that must have been a moment in heaven, and a moment for David. The sword that had been drawn against him was withdrawn, and it was put back in his sheath, and the battle was over.

And David, who'd been losing many another battle, now went out to win, because this battle with God was settled, and the sword of the Lord was back in its sheath. I do hope that as we close this week, that's your experience.

The sword of the Lord is withdrawn. Controversy with heaven is over, and the peace of God has come into your heart once again. I just would like to quote these words of this wonderful hymn of A. B. Simpson.

Do you remember it? I take salvation full and free, through him who gave his life for me. He undertakes my all to thee, I take, he undertakes. I take the promised Holy Spirit, I take the power of Pentecost, to fill me to the uttermost, I take, he undertakes.

I simply take him at his word, I pray to him that my prayer is heard, I claim my answer from the Lord, I take, he undertakes. I take thee, blessed Lord, I give myself to thee, and thou according to thy word dost undertake for me.

I take, with the controversy set, I take, and he undertakes. Shall we bow in prayer together? May we spend just one moment in quietness. Oh Father, as we lift our hearts to thee this morning, how we cry to thee that Satan may not have allowed any of us to escape facing the real issue in our heart.

Lord, if thy sword have been against any of us, if there's been the chastening hand of God because of our own sin, let these we look up into thy face today. We can truly say, peace, perfect peace. The blood of Jesus whispers peace within.

How we thank thee that Lord, when we've faced that which thou hast sought and pleaded with us to deal with, and we've told thee that we're willing, how we thank thee that the sword of the Lord is put in its sheath.

And as we leave this place today, may it be with the peace of God which passes all understanding, garrisoning our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. We ask it for his name's sake.