Alright, brethren. Back here
in 1 Samuel 23. What caught my attention on this
is down here at the very end in verse 28. It says, They called
that place Sila Hama Lekoth. And that means, the margin says,
the Rock of Divisions. say the rock of escape, it's
the rock of refuge, the rock of safety, and that's Christ. As Paul said about the smitten
rock, that spiritual rock is Christ. He's the rock of division. Now let's go back up here and
let's read through this a little bit. It says in verse 19, Zephites
came to Saul, to Gibeah, saying, Does not David hide himself with
us in strongholds in the wood, in the hill of Hekilah, which
is on the south of Jessamon? And so they go to Saul and they
tell him to come down. They tell him where David is,
there with them in their land, and they tell him to come down. So Saul tells them, You go ahead
and you You find him out, find him exactly where he is. And
you come and tell me and I'll come down. I'll go with you.
And we'll search him out. Now these, these Ziph, Ziph was
in Judah. It's in Judah. And these Ziphites
were of the same tribe as David. David had, the Lord had told
him to go to Judah and he'd gone to Judah. And there he is, he's
with these Ziphites who are of Judah. and they were his own
countrymen, they were his own tribe, and they went and betrayed
David to Saul. Now Christ, the scripture says,
Christ came unto his own, and his own received him not. Here
you have a foreshadowing of that. David comes to Judah, and here
his own kinsmen, his own tribesmen, Received Him not. And you know
Christ from His birth all the way through His whole life. The
devil used the Pharisees and the Sadducees to relentlessly
seek Christ's life. They, just like Saul, just relentlessly
was after David. He was trying to kill David. And they relentlessly sought
our Lord's life. But God, Scripture says, delivered
Him not into their hand. His hour was not come and the
time appointed of God from the foundation of the world was not
come and God didn't deliver him into his hand until that appointed
hour. Christ did it. He gave him permission. That's
what we read back up here at the very first of this. It says
David They were dwelling in the land of Ziph. And it says there
in verse 14, He abode in the wilderness and strongholds, remained
in a mountain in the wilderness of Ziph. And Saul sought Him
every day, but God delivered him not into His hand. They sought
Christ every day. But you keep reading, His hour
was not come. They never laid their hands on
Him. But then, like these Ziphites, eventually Judas betrayed our
Lord to the Pharisees, and they delivered him to the Romans,
and they put him on the cross. But by his death, our Lord conquered
every enemy for his people. He conquered every enemy we have.
And so we not only see a foreshadowing of Christ here, but we're going
to see in David here what our Lord is for his people. what
he is for his people. Now verse 24 says, they arose
and went to Ziph before Saul. But David and his men were in
the wilderness of Maon, in the plain on the south of Jessamon. So Saul also and his men went
to seek him. And now as they're coming, it
says here, and they told David. Somebody came and told David,
Saul's coming after you. Wherefore he came down into a
rock, and he abode in the wilderness of Mahon." Mahon means habitation. He came and abode in this wilderness
of habitation. And when Saul heard, he pursued
after David in the wilderness of Mahon. And Saul went on this
side of the mountain, and David and his men on that side of the
mountain. David made haste to get away for fear of Saul. For
Saul and his men compassed David and his men round about to take
them. Now you look at this. They call this place the Rock
of Division. Now here is the first division.
This mountain was between David and his men and between Saul
and his men. Some say it was a cliff and that
Saul could actually see David and they were going around each
side of it but others say it was actually a mountain sort
of ridge and Saul and his men were on one side and David and
his men were on the other. But this first division that
occurred is that rock kept them apart. It kept them apart. Here
is another division that occurred. Here is another division. Saul,
it says here, it says Saul and his men compassed David and his
men round about. In other words, Saul divided
his own men. and he sent some around one side
and he was sending some around the other side and they were
just going to try to encompass David so he couldn't get out,
him and his men. They were surrounding him. So
this was a division, first of all the mountain divided them,
but then there was a division amongst them. Saul divided his
own men amongst them. You know whenever, we're going
to come up to this in John 7, But it says in John 7 40 many
of the people when they heard this saying they said of a truth
This is the prophet speaking of Christ others said this is
this is the Christ. It's not the prophet. This is
the Christ But some said shall Christ come out of Galilee Had
not the scripture said Christ comes out of the of the seed
of David out of the town of Bethlehem Where David was so there was
a division among the people because of him Just like Saul and his
men who were after David were divided amongst themselves. The
people who were against Christ were divided amongst themselves.
They were divided, there was division because of Christ. It
says the Pharisees said, you know when they brought the blind
man in and they were questioning, the Pharisees said, this man's
not of God, he keeps not the Sabbath day. And others said,
how can a man that's a sinner do such miracles? and there was
a division among them. They were divided amongst themselves.
But then, as the enemy surrounded David, Saul's got his men, some
going one way, some going the other, and they got David trapped
in his men. And Saul thought he was just
about to get David. He really thought he had him
right here. He thought he had him. And another division occurred. Verse 27 says, but, this is one
of those divine divine acts of God's providence
right here. But, but God, for his great mercy
wherewith he loved his people. He says his great love. Look,
but there came a messenger unto Saul. You think that was by accident? The sovereign hand of God sent
this messenger to Saul. And he said, haste, they come,
for the Philistines have invaded the land. Wherefore Saul returned
from pursuing after David and went against the Philistines.
The first division was the rock, just dividing them, separating
them. The second division was amongst the enemies themselves.
Saul sent some of his men one way, some the other way, just
like men were divided concerning Christ. Here is the third division. A messenger is sent and said
the enemies invaded the land. So here you have Saul who is
an enemy of David. And what's he doing? He's going
and fighting another enemy of David. You've got enemies fighting
enemies now. So these three divisions have
occurred. And so it says here, therefore, verse 28, they called
that place Selahamalakoth, the rock of divisions. This is how
God made David to escape. It was the rock of safety, it
was the rock of refuge. And then David went up from thence
and dwelt in strongholds at Enjeti. Now there's only one rock who
divides every enemy from God's people. And that rock is Christ. He saves us, He keeps us, and
He doesn't lose anybody. And David declared that. David
was constantly going through many You know we talk about run
the race that God has set before you. This was the race God set
before David. And it led all through this wilderness
and all through these rocks and these mountains and these plains
and these valleys with Saul relentlessly pursuing him the whole way. And
so he was in and out of these caves and these strongholds.
And look at 2 Samuel and look at chapter 22 and here is what
David wrote. He said, this is this rock. He used that rock and those rocks
whereby he was saved, he used that as a picture of Christ,
a picture of our Lord. And listen to him here. He says
in 2 Samuel 22.2, well let's read verse 1. David spake unto
the Lord the words of this song in the day that the Lord had
delivered him out of the hand of all his enemies and out of
the hand of Saul. This was at the end when it was
fully accomplished. And he said, the Lord is my rock.
He's my fortress. This is what this rock of division
means. He's my rock, he's my fortress, my deliverer, the God
of my rock, in him will I trust. He's my shield. He is the horn
of my salvation. He is my high tower and my refuge,
my Savior. Thou savest me from violence. This is what it means to rock
a division. He is all these things to His
people. He is a high tower. He is a refuge. He is a Savior.
I will call on the Lord who is worthy to be praised. So shall
I be saved from my enemies. Look down at verse 32. He says in verse 32, for who
is God, save the Lord. And who is a rock, save our God. Save our God. God is my strength
and power. He maketh my way perfect. He
maketh my feet like hinds' feet, and setteth me upon high places.
Look down at verse 47. The Lord liveth, and blessed
be my rock, and exalted be the God of the rock of my salvation. Look back at 1 Samuel chapter
2. Hannah described the Lord the same way. Look at 1 Samuel
chapter 2 and verse 1. Hannah prayed and said, my heart
rejoiceth in the Lord. Mine horn, my strength is exalted
in the Lord. My mouth is enlarged over mine
enemies because I rejoice in thy salvation. There's none holy
as the Lord. He's the divider. He's the one
that's going to, he's the rock of division that's going to divide
and separate his people from all our enemies. There's none
holy as the Lord. That's what holy means. He's
the rock of separation, the rock of division. There's none beside
thee, neither is there any rock like our God. So our subject
is the rock of divisions. And that's who Christ is. First
of all, Christ is our rock who saves us from the curse and condemnation
of the law, from all our sins. the guilt of the law, the sin
of our nature, everything about what we are as we come into this
world. It says, verse 25 in our text, it says, Saul and his men
went to seek David. And the first thing it says,
they told David. Somebody came and told David.
And this is what's going to happen. God's going to send his messenger
to you. And you're going to hear it.
And for the first time, you're really going to hear it. And
you're going to hear what God has to say. And God's word is
going to say, the enemy is pursuing you. The enemy is after you. And that enemy is, it's because
of our sins, the law of God, the fury of God, the wrath of
God is upon those who are not in Christ. And he's going to
speak to you and he's going to, like they told David, Saul's
coming after you. This gospel is going to come
and say, there's an enemy pursuing you. He makes us hear the law
of God declare us absolutely, totally guilty. Not only because
of the multitude of our sins, and there is a multitude of our
sin. You think of every sin that you've
ever thought, every sin you've ever spoken, every sin you've
ever committed from the first breath that came out of your
lips until the last breath that comes out of your lips. They
got to be dealt with, all of them. And not only that, but
what we are, the sin we are, the sin we are and our nature.
When our Lord said, it's what's coming out of the heart that
defiles, He's saying our nature is absolutely thoroughly corrupt
before God. It has to go back to the dust.
From the worst sin to the very best work that a sinner does,
all are sin. All are sin. to come into this
world under the guilt and condemnation of God with a nature that's nothing
but sin. And just like Saul's men had
compassed David about, and the picture here, and the actual
reality of it is, is when they come around and circled around
David, there was nowhere for David to go. There was nothing
for David to do. He could not get out of this.
And that's where the Lord brings us and makes us to behold there's
nothing we can do to save ourselves. And he don't let us stop seeing
that. He don't let us stop realizing this, that this thing is gotta
be by the rock of division. It's gotta be by Christ. Because
we don't, we can't deliver ourselves from our sin. And he makes us
behold Christ on the cross. Now get the picture here in our
text. We can get a little picture of
this with this text. This mountain came between David
and the enemy. Whatever it was, whether it was
a cliff like some think and it was a chasm sort of that separated
them or whether it was a mountain that separated them. Either way,
it came between them and they couldn't get to each other. They
couldn't get to each other. Well, our Lord Jesus came here
and you try to imagine the wrath of God. We've seen natural things
that kind of give you a glimpse of the wrath of God. Wars and
just horrors that have taken place in the world and you see
natural disasters like tornadoes and you see just the destruction
of those things. But to stand before God This thing's not going to be
about what anybody else thought. It's not going to be about what
somebody else thought and whether you believe what they believed
or you didn't believe what they believed. It's going to be between
me and God. It's going to be between you
and God. And we're going to stand there.
And if we're not in Christ, we're talking about the wrath of God. We're talking about the wrath
of God. And Christ came between holy God and His people. Just like this mountain was between
David and his enemies, Christ came between His people and holy
God. And holy God poured out on Him
on Calvary's cross the fury of His wrath. His visage marred more than any
man. And that's not even getting to
the soul of it, to the bruising and the separation and the wrath
that occurred. Who can tell what that is? Who
could know what that is? The wrath of God. But He bore
that, brethren, and the blows of God's vengeance came upon
Him. Fierce vengeance against sin
came upon our Redeemer justly. And He bore that. You remember
Moses in the wilderness. He took the rod and he smoked
the rock. And that's the picture of Christ
on the cross. The rod of God's justice. That
holy justice of God. No other way could sin be put
away. No other way could justice be
satisfied. No other way could righteousness
be brought in. Because you and I, every breath
we take is sin. From the first to the last. And
that, we had to die. We had to be smitten. And Christ
was smitten in place of His people. And Christ our Rock justified
His people. He put away God's fury forever
from His people. He completely, thoroughly put
away the fury of God forever from His people. Vengeance, the
justice of God is put away in Christ toward His people. What
happens when God makes us behold our sins and behold Christ the
Rock of salvation? What happens when He makes us
behold Him? It says there in chapter 23, it says there in
verse 25, they told David, he heard it, wherefore he came down
into a rock. And he abode in the wilderness
of man. He came down into the rock and
he abode in the habitation. He came down into a rock. You
think about David at this time. David's got 600 men, but Saul's
got 3,000 soldiers at least. And David has got the Ziphites
now against him. He knows they betrayed him. His
own countrymen have betrayed him. And they're coming after
David. The Ziphites were coming too.
They're all coming after David. David's humbled. I mean, he's
weak. He has no way of saving himself at all. He's down. I know geographically
he went down, but I'm saying David was down in every way. Spiritually, physically, he was
down. He was humbled. He was brought
down. And God is going to humble us
when he shows us our sin on Christ on that cross, and he keeps doing
that. He keeps humbling us. When you
look at that cross, you're seeing There's no righteousness in me.
I don't want God to judge me. I don't want him to judge me
based on anything in me, ever. Because I see on that cross,
I couldn't answer one of a thousand. That's what brings you down.
You know, the pride of our sin nature puffs us up. And we just don't realize we're
puffed up. We don't realize it until God
makes us see it. And brings us down and strips
us and strips us and humbles us to where we see we don't have
any personal righteousness whatsoever. A believer don't have any personal
righteousness at all. None. Not any. Our righteousness is Him alone. It's Christ alone. We don't see how proud we are.
I didn't see how proud I was. Our righteousness has to be Christ
alone. He alone is going to present
us holy and without blame. He alone is going to be the acceptance
with God now and forever. Our faith, because it's mixed
with a sin nature we have, if it was in ourselves and we're
standing by our righteousness and there was some personal worthiness
in it, our faith is so mixed with unbelief. It's sin. Apart
from the blood of Christ, apart from the cleansing of Christ,
Our love, the fruit of the Spirit that He produces in us, mingled
with the sin of our old man is sin. Our most generous giving
has so much covetousness with it. It wouldn't be any generosity
or any benevolence at all if it was just judged upon us apart
from Christ. And so he's going to keep showing
us these things and showing us these things and keep us lowly,
lowly, lowly, lowly. It's the only way that we'll
say, I'm not better than that one. I'm not better than anybody.
How do you know that? Because I don't have anything
in me but sin. Period. David came down and he came into
this rock. Now we see him physically doing
this. How does a man do this spiritually? How does a sinner
do this spiritually? Well, he wrote Psalm 54 from
this. It was when the Ziphams had betrayed
him. And here's how it starts. Here's how a sinner enters into
Christ the Rock. He said, Save me, O God, by Thy
name and judge me. That word means strive. It's the same word that's translated
when the Lord said, I will not strive with man. I'm gone forever. He's saying he's here in a defenseless
place. He can't defend himself at all.
He can't do anything to save himself at all. Saul and his
men are around him and he says, save me, oh God, by thy name
and strive for me. Judge me, vindicate me, save
me by thy strength. Hear my prayer. Oh God, give
ear to the words of my mouth. It is the same thing we just
saw him say over in 2 Samuel 22 verse 4. He said, I will call
on the Lord who is worthy to be praised, so shall I be saved
from mine enemies. From a new heart, from a heart
that God has given you, you cry out to God confessing that you
absolutely Nothing. There's nothing you've ever thought,
said, or done but sin before God. It's a repentance to where you
see, I'm not ever, ever, ever, apart from Christ, I have nothing
in me that's going to make me accepted of God. Nothing. and
believing on Him, casting it all on Him and begging Him to
save you and to forgive you and have mercy
on you and not cast you out and not look upon you anywhere but
in Christ only. When did you pray that? When
did you draw near to God and beg Him in that brokenness and
beg Him to save you. Today, yesterday, the day before that,
every day, every day. We continually resort to Him
and abide in Maon, in our habitation. Psalm 71.1, look over there with
me. Psalm 71.1. In Thee, O Lord,
do I put my trust. Let me never be put to confusion.
That word is shame and confusion. You know why His people's never
gonna be put to shame and confusion? Because Christ bore the shame
and confusion on the cross. You know why Saul was willing
to put David to shame and confusion? He didn't know anything about
that shame and confusion that Christ bore on the cross. He bore that shame and confusion.
That's not going to let a sinner, a real sinner saved by God, try
to shame his brethren. Because Christ bore that. What's
it going to make you do? It's going to make you preach
this gospel to them and wait on God to bring them to this
point where David was and help them to Him. Deliver me in thy righteousness
and cause me to escape. Look, deliver me in thy righteousness
and cause me to escape. He's the rock of escape. He's
the way of escape. Incline thine ear unto me and
save me. Be thou my strong habitation. Be thou my mayon, whereunto I
may continually resort. Thou hast given commandment to
save me, for thou art my rock and my fortress. Saul didn't
believe that about David. But it didn't much matter what
Saul believed. It's between David and God. It's between you and
God. Between you and God. That's who, that's who, that's
who mattered. What think ye of Christ? That's
what God did for David. The Lord turned the enemy away.
In Psalm 54, David said, he had delivered me out of all my trouble.
Mine eye has seen his desire upon my enemies. That's what
the Lord did. He sent this message. He not
only divided him by that mountain. He not only divided the enemies
themselves. Then He sent a message and He
turned Saul back and He made enemy go against enemy and He
delivered David. Christ is our rock of refuge.
He is our rock of escape. The curse of the law is turned
back against His people. All the sins of His people are
put away. And you know what else He is going to do? He is going
to divide our sin nature from our new man. Because every believer
born of him's got two natures. We got a Saul in us, and we got
a David in us. We got an Esau in us, and we
got a Jacob in us. We got an Ishmael in us, and
we got an Isaac in us. And as it was in this day right
here in our text, that one that's born of the flesh persecutes
the one that's born of the spirit within us. Who's going to be
the rock of division? Who's going to keep the old man
down and keep you from falling away from Christ and keep you
believing on Christ? The Lord Jesus Christ, Him alone,
is going to do it by His Spirit. He's going to turn him away like
He did here. And what's going to be the result of that? That's
what makes you worship God the first hour from a true heart.
That makes you keep worshiping Him. He keeps showing you this. He saves us through the gospel.
We keep hearing it. We keep hearing about this deliverance.
He keeps showing us our sin, showing us our Savior, showing
us our sin, showing us our Savior, and all these other little deliverances
He gives us all through our life. And what did David say after
all of that? In Psalm 54 6, I will freely sacrifice unto thee. I
will praise thy name, O Lord, for it's good. You don't have to be constrained.
to want to serve Him. You don't have to be constrained
to want to spend and be spent for Him. You don't have to be
constrained. You're happy for Him to reign.
You're happy for Him to have the glory. You want to freely
worship Him. You want to freely sacrifice
unto Him. You freely want to love your
brethren. You freely want to give yourself
for them. You freely want to take the burden off of them.
You want to help them to Christ. Whatever you can do for them,
that's what you want to do for them. When they're against you,
you just keep preaching mercy. Keep preaching forgiveness. Keep
calling for unity and peace. That's what you keep doing. And he's not only this rock of
division, he's our rock of division and refuge for everything else. Everything else is okay. We're glad he's our rock of safety
and all the other things, but this is the main thing right
here. What about the cares of this world? He said, your father
knows you have need of these things. Seek first the kingdom
of God and His righteousness. These other things will be added
to you. Don't run after riches. Riches will blind you. Riches
will turn you from Christ. Riches will suck you up into
the world. Fear not, little flock. It's
your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. What about
persecution from the accuser? We know that we're no match for
the wiles of the devil. But Christ has conquered the
old serpent and He's going to save His child. He said, for
the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now
will I arise, saith the Lord, I'll set him in safety from him
that puffeth at him. That's God's promise. He's just
a puffer. Christ divided His accusers amongst
Himself. And that's what Saul and his
men, they were divided amongst themselves. God did that. And
he turned Saul against the Philistines, enemy against enemy. You know
what's happening in the world right now? Everybody complains
about how divided everybody is in the world and all this going
on. That's the rock of division,
keeping this world turned from his people on one another. He makes the Potshuds strive
against the Potshuds. He makes the earth swallow up
the flood so it won't destroy his people. Come my people, he
says, enter thou into thy chambers and shut your doors about you.
That's our rock, that's Christ. Hide yourself for a little moment
till this indignation be overpassed. That's where he brings you. A
man shall be a hiding place from the wind and the tempest. What
about the trials? I'm gonna end, I just wanna say
this real quick. Just think about David and Saul,
just David and Saul. Saul told his servants, kill
David. Jonathan rose up defended him. This is just just with Saul
how David delivered him Saul hurled a javelin at him
God made him miss Micah Saul's daughter David's wife Saul came
after him one time. She she got him up and let him
down the window in the basket. This is God delivered him Saul's
messengers came to arrest David, and they came there to arrest
him. God filled him with the Spirit. So as they heard Samuel
preach, they worshipped God for a little while. Saul got mad
and said, I'll go get him. So he went up there, and the
Lord did the same thing for him. Then in Keolah, David was warned,
and he was told, these men of Keolah are going to betray you,
David. So he went out to the wilderness. And now here he is
again, God delivering him again. He delivered us on Calvary's
cross. He's going to keep delivering His people. He just is. The name of the Lord is a strong
tower, the righteous runneth into it and is safe. Listen to
this. Within the cleft of His dear
side there all His saints in safety dwell, and what from Jesus
shall divide, not all the rage of earth and hell. Are you in a place where Saul
and his enemies have you just hemmed in and that's all you
can do. Run into the rock and trust him. That's all I can do. Go over to Psalm 62. Let me end
with this. Listen to this. David gives us
a word right here. Truly, verse 1, truly my soul
waiteth upon God, from Him cometh my salvation. He only is my rock
and my salvation. He is my defense. I shall not
be greatly moved. He spoke to his own soul. Look
now at verse 5. My soul, wait thou only. upon God. Just wait on God. For my expectations from Him,
that means my hopes in Him. My anchor is not in me. The anchor that's anchoring me,
it's not in me, it's not in anything I've done or not done. There's
so many sins that we've omitted that we were supposed to do.
There's no way we can boast that we're better than somebody else.
Not anyway. My expectation is from Him. Verse
6, He only is my rock and my salvation. He is my defense. I shall not be moved. Now, was David moved from one
place to another? Yes. Was he moved from this flesh
to eternity one day? Yes. What's he talking about,
I shall not be greatly moved? I won't be moved from Him. I'm
not worried about what men do. I'm going to be in Christ. That's
all the hope I got. And in that day, judge nothing
before the time, in that day, his people will stand and he'll
say, from the moment you was born to the last day of your
breath, you was perfectly righteous. That's what he's going to say
of his people. Perfectly righteous. And he says here, in God is my
salvation and my glory, the rock of my strength, my refuge is
in God. Now here he says something to
us, trust in him at all times. You people pour out your heart
before him, God is a refuge for us. Now that's so, amen. Let's pray together. Lord, we
pray that you would Make us truly come into these chambers. Make
us enter into this rock. Shut the doors and wait. Trust
You. Lord, we believe You. We trust
that You're going to do as You've promised. We ask You to save
us, keep saving us, save us to the end. Be our rock, Lord, and
we praise You. We glorify You. We give You all
the honor. Thank You, Lord, that You've
made us complete in Christ, make us helpers, make us to comfort
and encourage and Lord do it by making us see what
sinners we are. Make us see what righteousness
you've provided and mercy in Christ. Thank you, Lord. We ask it for each of our brethren.
We ask you for those that you haven't yet called out. Thank
you for mercy, Lord, in Christ's name, amen.