The Will & Authority of God
Download MP3Hey, everybody. This is the second time I'm I've said hi to you once before. Tonight, even. We've got repetition. Alright.
Jeffrey Heine:So then there's a cut. Hey, everybody. Hey. Hey. It's good to see everybody.
Jeffrey Heine:I'm glad that you all could be with us tonight. Especially as we're continuing, the study in the life of David. And, and and tonight, we're gonna be picking up last week, we left off in about midway through chapter 18 of first Samuel. And that's that's where we're gonna pick up tonight. We're gonna make our way through, lord willing, all the way through chapter 19 as well.
Jeffrey Heine:So where we left off last week, we were we were looking at Saul and his envy of David. And that envy really took a, there was a spark that kind of began that flame. Because David was victorious in battle yet again and came back. And he won the battle. And Saul heard this tune, this tune that the people were singing.
Jeffrey Heine:And it had to do with how Saul had killed his 1,000, but David his 10,000. And that wasn't enough to stir up that fear and envy? And Saul. And Saul actually said, well, what more? He's got this adoration of the people.
Jeffrey Heine:What what more does he have to take from me but the kingdom? And so, he was afraid. He was afraid that the throne was going to be taken from him. And so, David had the victory and and this fear came to Saul. And then Saul was sent, this harmful spirit by the Lord.
Jeffrey Heine:This harmful spirit rested on Saul. And he had he was sitting in his throne. And you can, you can kind of see this in your mind. He's sitting on his throne. He's in this throne room with his hand on a spear.
Jeffrey Heine:And anytime he was kind of in this, this state, this raving state, the Bible puts it and he's he he has David come in and play. Not the Leonard Cohen song that's been covered to death. Please stop everyone who's covering Hallelujah. But he's playing to to calm Saul. And and Saul is sitting there and the Bible actually makes this this comparison.
Jeffrey Heine:Saul has his hand on the spear, while David has his hand on the lyre as he's playing music for him. And Saul is overwhelmed with this desire to kill David. He wants, he wants to end it right there. As he's consumed with this desire to kill him, he throws the spear at David. He does this twice.
Jeffrey Heine:He tries twice to take the spear and he says, pin it to David. Twice he's trying to do that. And David gets away. He runs away. And Saul's desire to kill him is thwarted.
Jeffrey Heine:Saul has another idea. He hears we see this in in the very beginning of chapter 18. We hear that Jonathan, who is the son of Saul, Jonathan loves David. Then we see in verse 16 that all of Israel and Judah, they love David. And Saul gets word that his daughter Nicole, or Michael, loves David.
Jeffrey Heine:And he has this plan where she will be a snare to him, is what he says. A trap. And the trap is this, David is poor. David doesn't have a lot of money. And so, what he's going to do is he's going to say, You can marry my daughter and the bridal price, which usually that would be more than David could pay.
Jeffrey Heine:That's going to be the trap. So, Saul has this plan. And and, David's response when he hears that he has this opportunity to marry one of Saul's daughters, he says, I'm a poor man. I'm I'm a man of no reputation. Who am I to be a son-in-law to the king?
Jeffrey Heine:And Saul sends these servants to go in there to persuade him. You should do this. You can marry her. Now it's kind of strange, we don't really see if David loves Michal, but Michal loves David. And so David is wondering if he should do this and he's being convinced by all these people that he should marry her.
Jeffrey Heine:And word goes from Saul to David, look, the bridal price, it's not going to be money. Don't worry about that. It is, however, going to be a 100 foreskins of the Philistine. So that's not bizarre at all. If you don't know what that is, find an adult.
Jeffrey Heine:Don't Google, find an adult. Ask someone you can trust. Alright. So that's what he that's what he he demands. He says, for the for the bridal price, 100 foreskins of the Philistines.
Jeffrey Heine:Which is essentially saying, this is a certain way that you will die. But David takes him up on it and he doesn't just kill a 100 Philistines. He kills 200 And he takes the men, his men, go out and they they slay 200 Philistines. I don't know how he picked this band of men to go out and carry out this task. I definitely don't know who is the accountant in that group.
Jeffrey Heine:But they went out, they got the fulfilled number, and they came back to Saul. And if you would, look at look at verse, let's see. Where are we gonna be? Verse 27. Chapter 18 verse 27.
Jeffrey Heine:Pick up halfway through. And David. And David brought their foreskins, which were given in full number to the king, that he might become the king's son-in-law. And Saul gave him his daughter Michal for a wife. But when Saul saw and knew that the lord was with David and that Michal, Saul's daughter, loved him.
Jeffrey Heine:Saul was even more afraid of David. So Saul was David's enemy continually. So then, picking up in chapter 19, Saul tells everyone, essentially. All the men, all his son, Jonathan, he tells everyone, kill David. Because he, he hasn't been able to do it.
Jeffrey Heine:He didn't get to execute him. Then, the snare, the trap didn't work. McCall loved him. He was victorious. The Lord was with him and he was victorious in the pursuit of the Philistines and the bridal price.
Jeffrey Heine:He accomplished all of these things. And obviously the Lord was with him. And he was so angry and he was thwarted at every turn. And so he said, to all of those around him, he said, kill David. Jonathan, who loves David, tells him that.
Jeffrey Heine:He tells him of of the the plan of the king. And he says, here, here's what you should do. You should hide tonight. Hide and tomorrow in, in this area, I want you to be hidden, but I'm going to talk to my father about you. So the next day, that's what he did.
Jeffrey Heine:Jonathan talks to king Saul and he says, why, why are you seeking to kill him? First off, he's been victorious. He's been victorious in all these things that he's done. And it's been stuff that you've delighted in. You've been glad that he killed Goliath.
Jeffrey Heine:You've been glad that he's been taking on the Philistines and he's been victorious. Why would you kill him? He's been doing things that you approve of and delight in. And then he said, why would you do this against innocent blood? He, he actually says sin.
Jeffrey Heine:He says, why would you sin against innocent blood? Why would you do this? So Saul, kind of in this moment of clarity, he sees what's going on and he says, you're right. You're right. I'm wrong in this.
Jeffrey Heine:And, and the way that he responds is by saying this, as the Lord lives, no one will strike down David. Essentially, what he's saying is just as Yahweh lives, David lives. He swears this promise to his son Jonathan. Jonathan goes back and he tells David. David hears this and I guess gets the confidence up again and and goes back into the courts of Saul.
Jeffrey Heine:And he's again playing on the lyre. Well, then three things happen that have happened before. Battles with the Philistines. David goes out and he's victorious. Saul, again, harmful spirit to him.
Jeffrey Heine:And then 3rd, Saul tries to kill David. All these things that have happened before, they happen again. And so he has the spear, David has the lyre, he throws the spear, spear goes into the wall, David flees. And now that he's married, like any good man, he runs to his wife. And he runs to McCall and she says, if you don't flee tonight, they're going to kill you.
Jeffrey Heine:Because these messengers, another way that you could say they're just assassins, have come to David's home. Saul has said, go out, go go get him, and we're going to kill him in the morning. And so, this has gone out and and McCall says to David, you have to leave tonight. So he goes out the window and he flees. McCall then takes the statue, places it in the bed, takes goat hair.
Jeffrey Heine:Not the first time we've seen goat hair deceiving people. And so goat hair on on the statue's head, covers it up in bed, puts the clothes around it. And then the next day the messengers come in, the assassins come in and she says, he's sick. Which, I don't know why that's a good reason not to execute someone. But apparently, they go back to Saul and they're like, he's too sick to kill him.
Jeffrey Heine:He's like, how about you go and get the bed that he's in, and bring David and the bed to me, and I'll kill him. So they go. And when they go to the bed, they realize it's a statue. And Saul confronts McCall and he says, why would you do this to me? Why why would you deceive me like this?
Jeffrey Heine:And she says, he told me, let me go. Why should I kill you? She says that David threatened her and that's why she let him escape and why she covered for him. So David has now fled. And he has fled to find Samuel.
Jeffrey Heine:Samuel is in Ramah. In Ramah, that is where there's a there's a prophet camp. Not like you could pay and go to prophet camp, but like a but a group of prophets that are they're together and and they are prophesying, which which for them, they're not just like future telling. They are praying and worshiping the Lord. They are speaking truth about him.
Jeffrey Heine:A prophet is a mouthpiece of the Lord. And so they are, they're speaking true things about who Yahweh is. They're delighting in him. They're worshiping. There's this group of men that are doing that.
Jeffrey Heine:And David goes to Samuel and he joins with these men. As he joins up, word gets back to Saul what's going on in Ramah. And Saul decides to send messengers or assassins. He's sending them, go and get David. He sends them.
Jeffrey Heine:And as they approach, when they, when they come forward and they see Samuel standing in the midst of all of these prophets And And they too prophesied. Word gets back, Saul sends another group of messengers. And as soon as they hit the camp, the Spirit of God descends on them and they, too, begin to prophecy. A third group of assassins, people going with the intention of hunting David, they go. And when they approach the camp, they are overcome by the Spirit of God and they prophesy.
Jeffrey Heine:So, finally, just as in the situation before, when the messengers aren't getting the job done, Saul decides to roll up his sleeves and and get to work. So, he travels to Ramah. And as he's getting close, he stops at this well and he says, do you all know where David and Samuel are? And they say, yeah. He's in Ramah.
Jeffrey Heine:In the iowth. In Ramah. This camp. And so he goes. After 3 groups of messengers have failed, he goes.
Jeffrey Heine:Look with with me in, chapter 19 verse 23. Verse 23. And he went there to Nioath and Ramah, And the spirit of god came upon him also. And as he went, he prophesied until he came to Naioth and Ramah. And he too stripped off his clothes, and he too prophesied before Samuel.
Jeffrey Heine:And he lay naked all that day and all that night. Thus it is said, is Saul also among the prophets? Let's pray. God, we, we desire to hear from you tonight. We desire to know you and your truth.
Jeffrey Heine:And so spirit, we ask that you would lead us to your truth spirit, that you would open our eyes to to see you, our ears to hear you, our hearts to receive you. God, just we ask that you would continue to bless our time together as we as we seek to worship you and to know you better. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. So narrative can be kind of tricky.
Jeffrey Heine:It's storytelling, which I love. I love that it's a story. It's something that we walk through together. I I love that, that, that process of the story, but it can be a little bit difficult. Really we, there are 2 ditches that we sometimes can end up in, or there are 2 2 pulls that we have and that's to either reduce it down and kind of make the, the moral of the story, you know, we reduce it to a little moralism.
Jeffrey Heine:At the end of all those Hansel and Gretel and all that stuff, there's a, what's the moral of the story? If it's a grim storyteller, it's it's just be terrified constantly. But for a lot of the children's stories, it's it's what's the moral of the story, you know? And that's why you always leave a note. Like, you have a, you have something that you come back to.
Jeffrey Heine:You come back to a moralism kind of at the end. And we kind of want to do that. We want to, we want to take the story and we just want to reduce it down. Or we want to magnify it. We want to make it really complicated.
Jeffrey Heine:We want to we want to make it to where if you don't understand the Hebrew syntax of this one verse, if you don't get the literary context and historical context, if you don't get into that, then there's no chance that you're gonna understand any of this. We kind of pull to one side or the other, and we we want to reduce it or we want to just magnify it all and just say this one word is just the key. And I think that we we do our best theology first, our best theology, which is just thinking about God. We do our best theology when we do it together, when we do it as community. And I think that when it comes to this kind of an of an issue that we do it best when we kind of, when we live in the tension between these two things, because there's a lot of application here.
Jeffrey Heine:It might not seem like it on the face of it because this is kind of an odd passage of scripture. There's a story that unfolds, but what do I do with it? And then there's a lot to understand about the historical context and this literary structure of Samuel telling this story, you know, this progression of Samuel's anointing of Saul and anointing of David and this progression that's happening here. So there there's value in those things and we need to, we need to live in between and kind of resist the urge to see the Old Testament stories as, as like a casting call. It's like, who are you?
Jeffrey Heine:Are you Saul? Are you Goliath? Like, you know, we just want to put ourselves in the story like that and and to resist that, but to ask 2 questions. The first question is this, what does thus, what does this, this passage, what does this passage teach us about God? What does this teach us about God?
Jeffrey Heine:And the second question is this. What does this teach us about humanity? You and me. Because we have this temptation to kind of go in different directions. And I want us to think about this passage and this, with these two questions kind of at play.
Jeffrey Heine:What does this teach us about who God is? Because, ultimately, that's what the scriptures are about. The scriptures, this is a continuous story about who God is. It's revealing who God is. And so we ask this question, what does this teach us then about who God is?
Jeffrey Heine:I believe the first thing is this, God's will is relentless. The will of God, what he has ordained to come about, cannot be confused and it cannot be thwarted. 10 times. Did you pick up on this throughout this, the story? 10 times through through this passage alone.
Jeffrey Heine:This isn't the the last time David is going to be sought after by Saul. Not hardly. Ten times in this passage, Saul tried to kill David. Not not to mention the 200 encounters with Philistines and then telling the men in his court to go kill David. Ten different scenes where Saul says, I want him dead.
Jeffrey Heine:Saul would have overseen executions like crazy. I mean, like a king saying, I want that person dead, and their army around them. That, that, that should happen pretty easily. And he escaped every time. And we're not talking about coincidence here, we're talking about providence.
Jeffrey Heine:God's providence. What God wills, which is David to become the king of Israel, that would not be thwarted by Saul. The cause of all things is ultimately the will of God. This account of Saul seeking to destroy David, teaches us that God's will is sure. It is certain.
Jeffrey Heine:And this certain will of God, it brings us, A. W. Pink calls it this, amazement and adoration. When we see and so when we, when we approach a passage like this and we, we hear this story and it tells us of the relentless will of God, it should bring about this amazement and adoration in our hearts and minds. Because what's amazing is that God's will involves us.
Jeffrey Heine:Not just as spectators, not just as the people who listen to this story, but involves us as sons and daughters. And that's amazing. Pink wrote this. It says, the whole of my life stood open to his view from the beginning. He foresaw my every fall, my every sin, my every backsliding.
Jeffrey Heine:Yet nevertheless, he fixed his heart upon me. And oh, how the realization of this should bow me in wonder and worship before him. The will of god is relentless. What he wills to come about, will come about. The second thing is this, God's authority is limitless.
Jeffrey Heine:Again, this passage is about the king of Israel and his desire to have this poor man of no reputation killed. That that should have been pretty easy to do. With all the people at his command, That should have been easy. But the authority of God knows no limit. When we, first, Jess and I, when we first moved to Birmingham, we lived in these apartments in Mountain Brook.
Jeffrey Heine:And, there are kind of like 2 5 points really close together in Mountain Brook Village. And we are at one of the lights and when you sit there, especially at night, you can see multiple lights at one time. So you can see a red light and a green light at the same time. And we were sitting at a stoplight and this white neon slammed into the back of us. I got out of the car.
Jeffrey Heine:And I think I checked on them first. I mean, after I made sure that we were okay in the car, I think I asked them if they were okay. I hope I didn't just look at my car. I've seen that happen so many If you've been in Birmingham for very long, you've seen one of those fender benders. And then you're like and the guy just walks out and he just looks at his car.
Jeffrey Heine:You're like, there's a human behind you. You could ask if they're okay. So I hope that I did that. I probably didn't. But I, as I went back and I and I, I looked in the window and he has a map.
Jeffrey Heine:He's looking at a, he's looking at a map. Not like a phone map, like a, like one of those McNally, like big, he's got a map out. Magellan is sitting behind this neon and and he's and he just slammed into the back of us. And so the cop They come really quickly at Mountain Brook. It was fantastic.
Jeffrey Heine:And they they were there really fast and they they came up and, and we were talking to them and they said, Well, actually, because this line, like the line like where you were pulling out, where the line is and your car is over the line, that line begins Birmingham. There's the city limit there for Birmingham as far as their jurisdiction for the police response. So, we're gonna have to wait on them. I said, Okay. Some more time went by and we Is there a is there a reason it's taking this long?
Jeffrey Heine:Well, they just radioed. They're having a shift change. Apparently, it's a free for all in Birmingham during shift change. Go ahead and write that down, criminals. But, so we waited.
Jeffrey Heine:We waited because, because this line had been crossed. Now we were, we were in a different jurisdiction. And, and that, that image, there isn't a line in our life that if we cross it, we're out of the jurisdiction I'm not There's not an area of your life where you can cross that line and God just says, It's actually, unfortunately, somebody else's deal. I'll wait with you. I'll be a good comfort.
Jeffrey Heine:I'll hang with you this whole time. But nothing can really start. We can't start the paperwork. We can't do any of that until somebody else shows up. God's authority is limitless.
Jeffrey Heine:And Saul cannot escape God's jurisdiction. God is sovereign. And so when God established the throne, when, when the throne was established there in Israel, they didn't just become a self governing nation at that point. You know, so Saul was under the authority of God. And as he sought to kill and and we get a good picture here of when when he says, As Yahweh lives, David lives, and then he turns around and literally throws a spear at David, that tells you what he thinks about Yahweh.
Jeffrey Heine:At least in that situation right there. That that that's all you kind of need to know about what's happening in the mind of Saul right then and there. But, God's authority is limitless. Not only is he is god subject to none, he is influenced by none. Another A.
Jeffrey Heine:W. Pink quote here, he says this, God does as he pleases, only as he pleases, always as he pleases. Let me say it again because it kind of weaves around there. God does as he pleases, only as he pleases, always as he pleases. Nothing in your life crosses that line out of his authority and his sovereignty.
Jeffrey Heine:That, that brings both comfort and discomfort, right? Like that's, that's startling news, but that's a truth that should shape the way that we trust God and the way that we obey God. His will is relentless and his authority is limitless. What does this teach us about humanity? What does this teach us about about you and about me?
Jeffrey Heine:I believe it's this. It's not only this. This passage, obviously, there are so many things going on and there are so many different angles to approach it and so many sermons that can be preached out of it, which is why God's word is such a treasure. But, but when we're looking at it from this angle, I think that there's there's one thing that we should really try and grab onto here of what it teaches us about humanity. The only proper response to God's will and God's authority is humility.
Jeffrey Heine:When we, when we respond to God's relentless will and his limitless authority, we respond with humility. Because, we see a good picture here of what refusing to to do so, what, what happens. Saul refuses that. It's his own will. It's his own authority.
Jeffrey Heine:It's his, it's his own power that he's seeking after and refusing to come to God with humility leads to forced humility. Another word for that is humiliation. Look again at king Saul. At every turn his will is thwarted. His will is frustrated.
Jeffrey Heine:His authority. And then when he, when he is confronted by the spirit of God, as he's on this hunt to kill David, the anointed one, he is subjected to God's will and God's authority in a very powerful way. He is literally stripped bare. What he would have had on would have been a royal robe, stripped. He's laid out there.
Jeffrey Heine:And, the very words of his mouth are the words of God. He's laid out, stripped before God, confessing with his mouth the goodness of God, the greatness of God, the majesty of God, the authority of God, the will of God. That's what's on the lips of Saul. He is subject to humility. He is forced down by the spirit of God.
Jeffrey Heine:And new life in Jesus, new life that comes to us through Christ, brings us a will of humility, where we can now desire humility. We can stand before God with amazement and adoration. That is love. A loving humility. Because the, the only other option besides the loving humility is this grieved humiliation.
Jeffrey Heine:What does this teach us about humanity? The only proper response to god's will and authority is humility. In our old sin nature, it definitely fights against this. It fights against this response, our pride. It clouds our thinking and our desire, our hunger for our own authority, our own will.
Jeffrey Heine:But in Christ, we abandon our will. In Christ, we desire the Lord's will. Which we, we pray this in the, in the Lord's prayer. When he taught us how to pray, he said, Not, not my will, but yours be done. He's instructing us in in laying down our will and seeing the will of God as supreme.
Jeffrey Heine:And doing that out of love and trust and obedience. The alternative to the spirit of loving humility is grieved humiliation. Saul is stripped before the lord. The words of the lord are on his lips, and the true authority in Israel is on display. We are called to this humility.
Jeffrey Heine:We're also called to confidence. That confidence does not conflict with that humility. So we're told in Hebrews, we're told in Hebrews 4 that that we should come with all humility. We can and with confidence. We come with confidence to this throne of mercy.
Jeffrey Heine:So it's not a humility where we are fearful of God. We are to be in awe of him, but we come with a confident humility. All humility, all confidence to the Lord. The proper response to God's will and authority is humility. And it was God's will.
Jeffrey Heine:We see this in the story. What's being preserved here is God's will that David would one day take the throne. And obviously, that's not going to be happen. That's not going to be happening if if Saul throws the spear and hits. If he sends out the men and they kill him.
Jeffrey Heine:If 1 Philistine, 1 out of 200, had said, I don't think this is a good idea. And it killed David. But God's will and his authority And we also have this, this benefit, this blessing. Now, reading this 1000 of years later, because we know that the will is not just for David, King David, it's all it goes further to the son of David, the will of God. And we read this.
Jeffrey Heine:We, we read about this together corporately in Isaiah 53. If you wanna look at the front of your worship god, look at the last line that you all read together in bold there. You all did a great job reading it earlier, so maybe we could try it again. Okay? It's in bold.
Jeffrey Heine:It says all next to it. So let's read this together. Yet it was the will of the lord to trust him. He has put him to grief. It was the will of the lord to crush him.
Jeffrey Heine:This was God's will, this is God's authority that took Christ to the cross. This wasn't just a bunch of evil men with an evil plan carrying out evil acts. It wasn't just that. Now, it was that, but it wasn't just that. Much greater was this was the will of God to crush him.
Jeffrey Heine:Why? Because through those wounds, through that crushing, we are healed. That is God's authority and will at play, maybe better than than we've ever been able to conceive of his will and his authority, the cross. So if this is something, and I'm sure, I mean, it is it not for all of us a hard thing for us to conceive? Isn't it difficult for all of us to imagine this will and this authority like this?
Jeffrey Heine:Doesn't this rub all of us in a bad way? And just say, I still have some authority though, right? Like, I'm still, I have this will. And we just want to hold on to everything with such a a vice. We just want to grab onto it.
Jeffrey Heine:We don't want to let go of anything. And I just want to say, I know. I know. But, when we have a hard time with trying to understand what this kind of will and this kind of authority is even like, look to the cross. That's how we're gonna define and understand if, if we're gonna have a glossary of terms here, when we're talking about will and sovereignty and authority.
Jeffrey Heine:Before we start going to church fathers and writings and message boards and arguments and maybe family dinners that have ended with somebody throwing something, I don't know. But like, before you get into those kinds of images, think of the cross, because that is where we see God's will and his authority poured out magnificently because it was the will of God to crush him. But let's not stop there. It was the authority of god to raise him out of the grave. His authority to call Christ out of the grave.
Jeffrey Heine:And for Him to offer that resurrection life to you, That's the will and authority that we're talking about. We come to that will and that authority with humility. Humility born out of love and affection and adoration, but humility. And this Lenten season, it's, it's, it's good for us to remember what humility is supposed to look like. As Christ humbled himself and offered himself for us, he who knew no sin became sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God.
Jeffrey Heine:This is god's will and authority displayed for all to see. So, what is the moral of the story? Right? How do we reduce this down? It's what it's always been.
Jeffrey Heine:Repent and believe the gospel. That was Jesus's sermon. That's what he went out in, in Mark 1. His first words as he declared And he called people to action. That action was turning to God and believing.
Jeffrey Heine:And that's, that's the call tonight. So let's pray together. God, we thank you for your word. We thank you for an opportunity to come together, as sons and daughters. And we and we ask that you would continue to instruct our hearts and spirit.
Jeffrey Heine:Give us hearts to receive your word, and and and, God, lead us in how to respond. Help us to take great comfort in the accomplished work of Christ, that we don't, we don't leave this place trying to earn your favor, to earn your grace, to earn salvation. But, lord, that we, because of your your salvation, because of the work of Christ, that we would obey you, that we will be disciplined in our obedience and a and a worshipful love for you. So help us to trust and obey you as we go from this place. We thank you again for your word and your spirit.
Jeffrey Heine:Continue to lead us as a body tonight. We pray this in the name of Jesus.
Joel Brooks:Amen.
