Good morning. Let's open our
first hour with hymn number 39 out of the Spiral Bound Hymnal. Hymn number 39. Wretched, lost, condemned, and
dying Guilty, I deserved God's wrath Long I fought against my
master Hell-bent, I was courting death But the blood of Christ
had bought me He refused to let me die This poor sinner loved
by Jesus Must be conquered by and by At the time which was predestined
In the covenant of God's grace God in mercy sent His Spirit
Blessed time of love and grace to reveal His Son's great merit
as the sinner's substitute. I saw Jesus pleading, dying,
suffering as my substitute. Precious blood for sin's atonement
Justice could not ask for more I heard Christ cry, it is finished
And I could resist no more Thanks to God for intervening Grace
that broke my stubborn will. Grace that would not let me perish. Grace that rescued me from hell. Sovereign grace, I will proclaim
it. Irresistible and free Grace that
chose me and redeemed me God by grace alone saved me Sinner,
now you've heard my story Now I bid you trust my God Christ,
my all-sufficient Savior, saves poor sinners by His blood. Be seated. Good morning. If you'd like to open your Bibles
with me, we're going to be in 2 Samuel chapter 14, 2 Samuel
14. A couple of announcements before
we get started. In a few weeks, November the
10th, which is a Sunday, we'll have our We'll have lunch after
the service on that Sunday, so you all plan towards that, just
a covered dish. It'll be our 28th year together
as a congregation, so we'll be celebrating that. Also, I have
asked Sean Reynolds to come the Friday, our conference is the
17th, 18th, and 19th of January? I think that's right, that's
really close, 17th, 18th, and 19th, or 16th, 17th, 18th, it's
that weekend, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. And I've asked Sean to
bring the message on Friday night after our dinner together, and
then Saturday and Sunday, Todd and Angus from Australia will
be here. to preach for us those two days. So remember, that'll be here
before you know it. And let's, as the Lord enables
us, ask him to bless that time together. So let's ask his blessings
on this hour. Let's pray together. Our gracious Heavenly Father,
thank you that we are able to sing about our all sufficient
Savior, the one who successfully redeemed
us, paid the debt for our sin and
reconciled us to thee. Lord, we We so need you to bless
this time with your presence, with your power, with your spirit. Lord, how we need to hear your
voice. And we know that you speak by
your word. And so Lord, we pray that as
we open our Bibles, that you would open to us the mystery
of the gospel and Lord that you would speak to our hearts and
and cause us to to rest our hope and to find our joy and comfort
and all of our salvation in the finished work of our Savior,
thy dear son. Lord, we we pray now for the
meeting that we're planning in January, we ask, Lord, that you
would prepare our hearts and the hearts of the men that will
come to preach for us, and, Lord, that you'd be glorified in those
meetings and that your church would be built up, our hearts
be knit together in Christ. For it's in his name we pray.
Amen. 2 Samuel chapter 14, Joab, David's commander, is grieved over the fact that
Absalom, David's son, has been banished from Jerusalem because
of what he did in taking his brother's life, Amnon, And so Absalom goes to the town
of Tekoa and he finds a woman there and gives to her a story
to bring to King David. And so she goes to David and
she feigns to be a woman grieving over the loss of her husband
and over the loss of her son. And she presents to David this
scenario given to her by Joab in hopes that David would be
moved to show favor to her and recover that which would be banished
if he didn't. The end, she does for David exactly
what Nathan did. You remember in the previous
chapter when Nathan comes before David and presents to David this
parable, this allegory, this story of a man who takes his
neighbor's sheep, his only sheep, and feeds his guest with his
neighbor's lamb. And David is enraged over what
he thought was a true story until Nathan said to David, David,
thou art the man. That's what you've done in taking
Bathsheba and in putting her husband Uriah to death. And David
is brought to repentance over that. He realizes that this was
all about him. And now in chapter 13, Amnon, David's son, takes his
half-sister Tamar and takes advantage of her. And Tamar's brother Absalom,
another of David's sons, kills Amnon in revenge over what Amnon
had done. And as a result of that, now,
Absalom must flee because the law required Absalom's death
as a result of what Absalom had done in taking Amnon's life. David has the power to restore
his son who has been banished. I've titled this message Hope
for the Banished because the truth is that the Lord has given
us these types, these stories, these parables to help us to see our need for God's
mercy and to reveal to us the means by which the Lord provides
that mercy. So many, I mean, I've just mentioned
two, so many parables, so many stories given in the Bible. And the disciples asked the Lord
once, they said, Lord, why do you speak to them in parables?
And you remember what the Lord said, because it's not for them
to know the mystery of the kingdom of God. In these stories, there
are pictures of God's work of redemption in the person of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And they are for our benefit.
They are for our salvation. If we can, by God's grace, see
ourselves in the characters of these stories, The truth is that you and I have
done exactly what Absalom did. We have taken the life of our
brother. If we go to Zechariah chapter
12, which we won't do right now for the sake of time, but the
Lord gives this prophecy when he said, when the spirit of grace
and the spirit of supplication is poured out upon the house
of Israel and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, they will mourn
after him whom they have pierced as one who mourneth after his
own son. It was our sin that put the Lord
Jesus on Calvary's cross. We bear the shame, we bear the
responsibility, we bear the guilt for having killed the Son of
God. And as a result of that, we're
banished. It is our sin that has separated
us from God, but also as a result of that, we are redeemed from
our banishment. And we're brought back into fellowship
with the God that we've been separated from. David has spent three years now
in banishment for what he did. The toll of David loved his son
Absalom. And the last verse of chapter
13, the last verse of chapter 13 says, the soul of King David
longed to go forth unto Absalom for he was comforted concerning
Amnon seeing that he was dead. Three years have passed. David
has recovered from the death of his son Amnon, and he is now
grieving for the restoration of Absalom, who has been banished
from the kingdom. And Joab, the scripture tells
us in verse one of chapter 14, Joab, the son of Zariah. Now,
Zariah was David's sister. So Joab is David's nephew, which
would also make him Absalom's cousin. And Joab and Absalom
would have been the same age. They would have grown up together. Joab wants Absalom restored. David wants Absalom restored,
but As of yet, it hasn't happened. And the toll of Absalom's banishment
is affecting the entire kingdom. It's affecting David, the grief
that David has experienced. It's threatening the wellbeing
of everyone in David's kingdom. And yet, David hasn't done anything
to rectify the problem. And David was real good at putting
things off, sweeping things under the rug, not doing... I mean,
it was the reason why so many things have already happened
in David's life. And Joab steps up and takes matters
into his own hands And as I mentioned already, he goes, look at verse
two, with Joab sent to Tekoa and fetched thence a wise woman
and said unto her, I pray thee feign thyself to be a mourner
and put on now mourning apparel and anoint not thyself with oil,
but be as a woman that had a long time mourned for the dead, and
come to the king and speak on this manner unto him, so Joab
put the words in her mouth." Now she's going to go to David,
and she's going to tell David that her husband has died, that
her two sons were striving together, fighting in the field, and that
there was no man there to separate them, and one killed the other. And the law required the avenger
of blood, the next of kin, to take the life of her only son. She's got no heir now. And it
lied in David's hands. to make a decree that would save
this woman's son. He didn't know it was a parable.
He didn't know it was a story any more than he knew what Nathan
was telling him was a story. He thought this was happening. And so David, after hearing this
story, says to this woman, I have decreed that nothing should happen
to your only living heir. For if he died, then the name
of her husband and the name of her family would be cut off.
It would cease to exist from Israel. And the only hope of her enjoying
the benefits of God's salvation to his people would be that her
son would be restored. And so David listens to this
story and in verse 9, the woman of Tekoa
said unto the king, my lord, O king, the iniquity be on me
and on my father's house And the king in his throne be guiltless.
And the king said, whosoever sayeth ought unto thee, bring
him to me and he shall not touch thee anymore. Then she said,
I pray thee, let the king remember the Lord, thy God, that thou
wouldest not suffer the revengers of blood to destroy any more,
lest they destroy my son. And he said, as the Lord liveth,
there shall not one hair of thy son fall to the earth. This woman is telling David,
my son is fleeing for his life, and only a word from you will
save him. In verse 12, and the woman said,
let thine handmaid, I pray thee, speak one word unto my lord the
king. And he said, say on. And the
woman said, wherefore then hast thou thought such a thing against
the people of God. For the king doth speak this
thing as one which is faulty, in that the king doth not fetch
home again his banished. For we must needs die, and are
as water spilt out on the ground which cannot be gathered up again.
Neither doth God respect any person, yet doth he devise means
that his banished be not expelled from him. God has devised a means for his
banished not to be expelled from him, not to be poured out like
water onto the ground where there's no hope of restoration. And she's using this story that
Joab gave her to caused the king to see that his banished son
needs redemption, needs restoration. As I said, you and I have strove
with our brother. That's exactly what happened
at Calvary's Cross when There was no man to separate us from
him. The Lord forsook him. The Lord Jesus said, I could
have called 12 legions of angels. They would have come and delivered
me. But there was no man. This woman's telling David There
was no one there in the field, it was just my two boys. There
was no one there to separate them. And the one killed the
other. And now the one guilty has been,
is fleeing for his life and is in need of redemption, he's in
need of restoration. That's exactly what happened.
Go back with me all the way to the story of Cain and Abel. We often look at that story as
Abel being a type of a believer who makes a blood sacrifice and
that that blood sacrifice was pleasing in the sight of God,
whereas Cain, brings the fruits of his own labors and it's a
picture of the gospel of God's free grace in the redemption
of his people through the shed blood of the Lamb of God, the
Lord Jesus Christ, versus a message of salvation that's
dependent upon something that we do. And certainly that's the
case in that story. That story also tells us that
Abel, Abel was a keeper of sheep. He was a keeper of sheep. And
Abel's name translated means breath. And we see in the story of Cain
and Abel a picture of the death of the Lord Jesus Christ who
is the keeper of his sheep. He is the great shepherd of the
sheep and he is the breath of life
for us. We have no life outside of what
he gives in the power of his Holy Spirit. Cain, on the other
hand, the scripture says was a tiller of the ground. Now the
ground is a picture of our flesh. That's where we came from. The
Lord fashioned our bodies from the dust of the earth and he
breathed life into us. And all we've ever been able
to do is till the ground by our own strength. And Cain's name translated means
possession. He, that's all he possessed was
the ground and he was in possession, under possession we should say,
even as you and I are. And when Cain slew his brother
Abel, what does God say? What does God say to Cain? Cain,
where's your brother? And what's Cain's first response? What am I, my brother's keeper?
I'm not responsible for my brother. Oh yes, the voice of your brother's
blood cries out from the ground against you. The voice of our brother's blood
cries out from the ground for us, for us. You see, You and I are guilty
of the worst murder of all, aren't we? We, when God gave man the freedom and the ability to
do what he wanted to do, he killed his son. That's our, by nature, that's
our hatred toward God. And as a result of that, we've
been banished. And now, Joab, a friend of the king, Joab sends
this wise woman to intercede with God on our behalf. And she says to him, shall the
whole kingdom suffer? Shall there not be some means? Let's look at that verse again.
Go back with me to the end of verse 13. For the king doth speak
this thing as one which is faulty in that the king doth not fetch
home again his banished. For must we all die and be as
water spilt out on the ground which cannot be gathered up again?
Neither doth God respect any persons." There's no respecter of persons
with God. In other words, God does not
factor in to his work of redemption our status or our contribution
participation or our intentions or anything. God doesn't do that. He's not a respecter of persons
in the way in which we are. Yet doth he devise means. God has devised means by which
his banished might be restored and brought back into fellowship
with him. Now that's the story. And the question now is what
are the means which God has provided for his banished children to be restored
again unto him. Absalom's gonna come home. And
the end of chapter 14, Absalom and David embrace, and their
love is renewed, and the banished son has been redeemed. Now, Absalom's
gonna take on a different picture, as we'll see. in the following
chapters, but for now, this is the story. This is the picture. If I'm guilty of the blood of
the Son of God, if I, by the way, Amnon, Amnon's name, now
we know what Amnon did in the previous chapter and there's
no, there's, well, there's no redemption in what Amnon did.
But Amnon's name translated means faithful. That's what his name
means, faithful. And we have a Savior who has
always been faithful to his Father. Perfectly faithful in every way. Absalom's name, you know it,
Abba, father, Salome, peace. My father's peace or peace with
my father. How can I have peace with my
father when I have killed the faithful one? And this woman says to David,
you just pronounced You just pronounced a decree saying that
not a hair on my only surviving son's head would fall to the
ground. And that decree stands. Do you not have the same authority
and power to restore your own son for the health of Israel
and for the salvation of us all? Yes. And these are the means,
this is one of the means by which God provides redemption for his
banished sons and daughters. A sovereign decree, a sovereign
decree. God decreed before time ever
was that there would be salvation for his people. And he's sovereign
in that. And there's no way for that decree
to be changed. No way for it to be changed.
The king's decree is set. And because he has the power
and the authority to speak this message of salvation and this
message of hope, we have. We have hope. that what we did
to our brother, that we can be restored in fellowship
with our heavenly father. She also mentions in her parable
to David the Avenger of Blood pursuing
her only surviving son. Now the Avenger of Blood was
the next of kin who had the legal right to take the life of the
murderer for what he had done. An eye for an eye, a tooth for
a tooth, a life for a life. And the Avenger of Blood had
the right to take the life of her only son. And she said, they're
pursuing my son and they're gonna kill him. What did God provide for the
man slayer in the Old Testament? Six cities. Six cities, the number
of man, that's our number. Three cities on the east of the
Jordan, three cities on the west of the Jordan, all equally separated
amongst the people of Israel so that one who slew another
man could flee to that city of refuge. There were signs posted
everywhere telling where the nearest city of refuge was so
that if you killed another person, you could flee to that city.
and remain in that city, and as long as you were in that city,
the next of kin could not avenge the blood of their loved one on you. You were
safe in the city of refuge. And you remained in that city
until the death of the high priest, and then you could come home. And what a glorious picture.
This woman is saying, you know, God has provided means for our
banished to be restored in fellowship with their father. And here's
the means, he's given the king authority to speak a word. Your sins are forgiven you. Didn't
the Lord just say that? Only God can forgive sins. What
is easier to say, your sins are forgiven you or take up your
bed and walk, but that you might know that the son of man has
the power to forgive sin. By his own word, by his own decree,
he can put away sin. I say unto you, take up your
bed and walk. We rest the hope of our salvation
on the spoken word of God. the revealed word of God. Lord,
you're the one, you're the only one that can speak truth and
peace and hope and salvation to my soul. You have the authority
to do that. Lord, I pray that you would speak. We can't, we don't have that
comfort in any other voice, in any other means but the means
by which God speaks. And we rest our immortal souls
on the declared decrees of our God who speaks truth and peace
and hope and life to our hearts. And then we flee to Christ. Oh, we... We don't spend our
time wallowing in the guilt of our sin. We don't spend our time
looking for any other means of salvation for what we've done.
We flee to the city of refuge. And in the death of our high
priest, we're restored back into fellowship with our heavenly
father. Oh, what a, and the avenger of blood, the law, that's the
avenger of blood is the law. It's the law that said a lie
for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. It's the law that, the law can't
save us. The keeping of the law can't
provide for us any righteousness before God. The law has one message,
death, guilt, judgment. That's all the law can do. And
it will pursue us. Until we're found hid in Christ. Hid in Christ, that city of refuge. Oh, we have that. And then, there's
a kinsman redeemer. One who's nearer unto us than
the law. And I'm thinking, about the story
of Ruth. Naomi and her husband and her
two sons had fled the famine that was in Bethlehem, the city
of bread. And they went to Moab thinking
that they would have a better life. And Naomi's husband and
her two sons died in Moab. And now Naomi comes back to Bethlehem. And she brings Ruth, her daughter-in-law,
with her. They said, is this Naomi? She
said, don't call me Naomi, call me Mara. For God has dealt bitterly
with me. I have no hope. My sons are dead,
my husband's dead. My life is over." And then who
steps up on the scene? Boaz. Boaz. And Naomi realizes that Boaz
is in love with Ruth. And Naomi says to Ruth, you go
to the threshing floor You go to that place where the wheat
is harvested, where the chaff is separated from the wheat,
where the wind of God's Spirit blows and provides the bread
of life for the soul. That's where we are at. We're
at God's threshing floor. Every time we come together,
we're casting God's Word up into the air. We're praying for the
Word of... for the Spirit of God to take
the Word of God and make it effectual to our hearts. And Boaz is now going to redeem Ruth
and in redeeming Ruth, he's going to redeem Naomi. And Boaz says to Ruth, there
is a kinsman nearer to you than me. Let me
go deal with him. And if he's able to redeem you,
then he'll be the one to redeem you. But if he's not able, then
I'll redeem you. And so Boaz goes to the city
gate and he brings 10 elders, a picture of the law, together
and he meets with this kinsman who is nearer to Naomi than Boaz
was. And Boaz now says to this other
kinsman, he said, Naomi, Chilion's wife, has returned from Moab
and she's in need of being redeemed. She's in need of being brought
back in to the family of God. And if you're gonna redeem her,
redeem her. And the kinsman said, I'll redeem
her. And then Boaz says to this man,
in the day in which you redeem Naomi, you must also redeem Ruth,
the Moabitess. And that kinsman says to Boaz,
I can't do that. If I take a Moabitess into my
family, I will mar my inheritance. Now that kinsman is the law. And the law is nearer to us than
anything else. We're accountable to God for
the law. But the law says to us, I can't
redeem you. You're a Moabitist. My law is
holy. My law is just. My law is good. My law can't be compromised.
My law can't be lowered. I can't lower the standard of
God's law. If I bring you into my family,
I would have to do that. And so, the kinsman says to Boaz,
you redeem her. You redeem her. And Boaz did
that. And because Boaz was able to
redeem her, Ruth is not only brought into
the family of God, but she's brought into the lineage of the
Lord Jesus Christ. She becomes the mother of Obed,
Obed is the father of Jesse, Jesse is the father of David.
She's the great, great grandmother of King David. And in the very lineage of Christ,
only a kinsman redeemer can do that. Absalom has been banished according
to the demands of the law. David has the power to declare a decree for the redemption
of his son. This woman says, has God not
provided means for the kinsmen redeemer? Has he not provided
means for the cities of refuge? Is it necessary? Is it required
that we all be poured out like water onto the ground which cannot
be restored again? And David says, yes, those means
will be brought to bear and not a hair of your son's head will
fall to the ground, though he be guilty. The banished shall be brought
back into fellowship. All right, let's take a break.