In 2 Samuel and chapter 23, near
the end of David's life, we read his last words where it is written. Now these be the last words of
David. David the son of Jesse said,
and the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the
God of Jacob and the sweet psalmist of Israel said, The Spirit of
the Lord spake by me, and his word was in my tongue. The God
of Israel said, the Rock of Israel spake to me, he that ruleth over
men must be just, ruling in the fear of God. And he shall be
as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning
without clouds, as the tender grass springing out of the earth.
by clear shining after rain. Although my house be not so with
God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered
in all things and sure, for this is all my salvation and all my
desire, although he make it not to grow. Although my house be
not so with God, Yet He hath made with me an everlasting covenant,
ordered in all things and sure. For this is all my salvation
and all my desire, although we make it not to grow up." What
a glorious hope David had in that everlasting covenant which
God had made. What a glorious hope of salvation. This is all my salvation. All
my desire. This is the great king of Israel. A king who had many things as
king. A king who knew what it was to
both abound and also to be abased. David had known much in his lifetime. He'd come from humble beginnings
and was raised up to great heights. But he also knew great tragedy. He knew what it was to be hounded
and hunted for his life. He knew what it was to suffer
great loss. He suffered the loss of that
first son by Bathsheba and he suffered the loss of that beloved
son, Absalom. He knew what it was to suffer
tragedy and he knew what it was to see the reality of his own
heart and his own wretchedness, his own sin. He knew that some
things came upon him because of his own rebellion against
God, his own wickedness, his own selfishness. And he knew
the great mercy and forgiveness of God, that in spite of all
his sin, all his rebellion, all his pride, all the wickedness
of his natural heart, God still loved him. God forgave him. God showed mercy unto him. God
was his salvation. And God made with him an everlasting
covenant, ordered in all things and sure. David's house, his
household, was not as he might desire it to be. Absalom, his
beloved son, rose up against him in his own pride, in his
own love of popular acclaim and the love of the adulation of
the people. That great son Absalom, that
handsome man, that man popular with the people who stole the
hearts of the people of Israel. was so flattered by the people's
following and so taken over by his own greed and desire that
he rose up as a rival to his own father. He made himself king. He rose up in rebellion against
his own father. And in the end, he went to war
with his father. He took his father's throne.
He became king. And then he went to war with
his own father, David. What a tragedy for David. He
loved Absalom. And Absalom turned against him.
And in the end, in the battle which arose in the woods of Ephraim,
As we read of in 2 Samuel 18, Absalom is slain. And although
Absalom had risen up in rebellion against David, and although David's
natural response could be one of fury and anger, And although
David in a sense could have been glad to see his enemy overthrown
and the battle won, nevertheless the great love of the father
for his son moved David to command his army and the leaders of his
army. Joab and Abishai and Ittai to
say, don't touch, don't put one hand to that young man Absalom
when you go to war with this army of his. Don't touch Absalom. Leave him alive. And yet, when
the news is brought back to David by the messengers, by Cushi,
that Absalom is slain. How moved David is. We read in
2 Samuel 18 verse 33, And the king was much moved, and went
up to the chamber over the gate and wept. And as he went, thus
he said, O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom, Would God
I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son. No matter what Absalom had done,
David loved him. He loved his son. What a tragedy
for David. What heartache. And yet though
this came about, he could still rejoice. and hope and trust in
that everlasting covenant that his merciful, gracious and loving
God had made with him. That everlasting covenant. That
covenant of which David speaks, that covenant in which David
trusted, in which he saw that his God would save him, would
deliver his soul, that his God would provide a sacrifice for
his own sins, that he would deliver David from
condemnation, because God would pour out his judgment against
David's sins upon a substitute, upon a sacrifice that God would
provide. That covenant in which God would
promise David and promise all those like David who were brought
to know the love of God and the promise of God in his covenant
for them. That covenant promised to deliver David and
the people of God from his sin and their sins because of the
outpouring of God's wrath upon a sacrifice. The judgment of
God against David's sins poured out upon another in order that
God could reckon David righteous and deliver him from his sins.
David knew this covenant. He saw it in all the types and
figures in the scriptures. He saw it in Abraham and Isaac
and how Abraham was commanded to offer up Isaac his son and
how God stopped him and found a sacrifice, found a ram and
offered that up instead and how Abraham was shown the sacrificial
substitute that God would provide for his sins. David knew this,
he knew the same God, he knew the same Gospel, he knew the
same Covenant and he believed it. God had made it known unto
him in so many ways that God would send Messiah. God would
send his Son as a sacrifice for David's sins. God would slay
his own Son for David. and deliver David, and wash him
clean in the blood of the sacrifice, and make David in that sacrifice
to be the very righteousness of God. These things hadn't come
to pass, but David, that great psalmist, that great king, that
great prophet of Israel, was made to see these things, and
believe these things. God revealed them unto him. God
made these things known unto him. This is how David in this
chapter 23 in his last words could say of himself that he
was the man that God raised up on high, the anointed of the
God of Jacob and the sweet psalmist of Israel. The Spirit of the
Lord spake by me, and His word was in my tongue. The God of
Israel said, the Rock of Israel spake to me. He that ruleth over
men must be just, ruling in the fear of God. And he shall be
as the light of the morning when the sun rises, even a morning
without clouds, as the tender grass springing out of the earth
by clear shining after rain. God has spoken through David,
the Spirit of God has spoken through David and the Spirit
of God has shown David the covenant. And how man must be just with
God. And how the light of God must
shine. Shine through those who will
rule over men. Shine through those who will
stand before God righteous. Shine through those. who God
saves through his covenant. What insights David was shown.
But the insights that David was shown were not just revelations
that God gave under him, were not just an opening of David's
eyes through the scriptures and through the record of the patriarchs. David didn't just see the truth
of the covenant and the truth of the gospel, through reading
of Abraham and Isaac, and Noah in the flood, and Adam and Eve
in the garden, clothed with those animal skins. He didn't just
come to see the types and figures through the scriptures, but he
came to see these things impressed upon him through the realities
of his own experience as a father and a man. The tragedy of Absalom made known the Gospel to David
in a way that few can understand it. David himself was brought
to know something of what God the Father would know when his
own son Jesus Christ was offered up as a sacrifice for sin. Absalom
died in a tree. Absalom's heart was speared through,
thrust through with three darts. Absalom, the son of the king,
was dead. The king was much moved and wept
and said, oh my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom, Would
God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son. He lost his son. And he knew something of what
God the Father would feel when he lost his son, when Christ
was offered up and slain upon the tree. My son. My son. When Christ when Christ hung upon the cross
in the darkness. He echoed such words to his father. Spiritually the father cried
with David, my son, my son. And the son hanging upon the
cross cried out, Eli, Eli, Lama Sabaqfani, my God, my God. Why hast thou forsaken me? O the great love in the covenant
that the Son had for the Father and the Father had for the Son. My God, my God, my Son, my Son. Now Absalom, in the account of his life, is
very much presented to us as a picture of rebellious man. Not as a picture of Christ as
the righteous son of God, but a picture of what Christ as the
substitute was made to be when he took upon himself the sins
of his people. the sins of those who had fallen
in Adam and gone astray and rebelled against their maker. As the substitute,
Christ stood before Almighty God guilty in the way that Absalom
was guilty. Absalom rebelled against his
father. In his greed, in his lust, in
his pride, in his ambition, he desired all that was his father's. He desired the throne of his
father. He desired to be king. He desired
the kingdom. He desired the reign. He desired the glory. He desired
the power. And he rebelled against his very
own father. He turned against him. He made
himself king. He took the applause of the people. He took his father's throne,
as it were, and he went to war against David, his father. He
went to war against him. And in that battle, in the battle
in the woods of Ephraim, He died with his head caught in a great
oak. In this we see fallen man and
his rebellion against God. We see in Absalom a picture of
the covenant. A picture of all mankind in Adam,
fallen in sin, rebelling against God their Father. We've all gone
astray. We've all, as it were in our
hearts, made ourselves king. We've all stolen God's throne. We place ourselves upon it and
we go to war with God. We won't go His way, we will
go our way. We won't serve God, we will serve
ourselves. We won't glory in God, we'll
glory in ourselves, full of our own pride and our own ambition.
We've displaced God and put ourselves on his throne. We've gone Absalom's
way and we've gone to war with our father. We're as guilty as
Absalom was. And Absalom's presented to us
as a picture of what we are, as sinners in Adam and his death. is presented unto us. As the
deaf, we will die outside of Christ if we know not God. But
also the deaf, that Christ died as a substitute for his people,
taking upon himself the sins of, as it were, Absalom, the
sins of his people in Adam, and bearing them and being slain
in the tree as Absalom was slain. And being thrust through with
a spear which brought forth blood and water. Dying in the place of sinners
as a fulfilment of the everlasting covenant. In the death of Absalom, David's
mourning over the loss of his beloved son, we see a picture
of the substitute of sinners. Christ, the Son of God, taking
the sinner's place. He stands in the place of the
rebellious son. He's offered up upon a tree. He dies because of the rebellion
of Absalom, of the sinner in Adam. and how His Father looks
upon Him, My Son, My Son. For the Father, Christ His Son,
is offered up. He stands in the place of those
who've turned against God, those who've sought the Father's kingdom,
those who've sought the Father's throne, those who've gone to
war with Him. and how the father feels the
loss of his son. How he feels the loss of him
when Christ hung there in the darkness, hanging upon the tree
as Absalom hung on the boughs of that great oak tree. How the
father looks and beholds in the darkness what his son has become. That beloved son, that son whom
he loved, look what he's become. He hangs in the darkness, a great
sinner. The substitute, bearing the sins
of his people, made sin. Look what his son is now. Look
where he is now. Estranged. Far off. Guilty. Suffering under the righteous
judgment of God, when Christ hung there in the darkness. as
a sinner made sin by that mysterious transaction where God took the
sins of his people and laid them upon his own son and caused that
son who knew no sin to be made sin. When God laid upon him the
sins of his people, God had to pour down judgment and wrath
against him. His righteousness demanded the
death of the sinner. And God judged him. But oh, the
pain to judge his own son. Oh, the pain to pour down that
wrath upon his own son. My son, my son. Oh, how I would have died for thee.
And the son cries out to his father in such a state whom he
loved. Who in faith He trusted, the
Son cries out, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? O the depths of the suffering
of Christ upon the cross, and what the Father suffered in giving
Him. O the depths of the covenant
that the Father and the Son should promise to do this and should
go through it and the Spirit should promise to be involved
and make it known. The Spirit should go forth as
a messenger and declare what has been done. Absalom, O my son Absalom, my
son, my son Absalom, would God I had died for thee, O Absalom,
my son, my son. Though my house be not so with
God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered
in all things and sure. David knew this covenant. He knew this covenant personally. He knew what this covenant would
cost. He knew what it would cost his
God and Saviour to go through with this for him. He knew what
it was to lose his son. He knew what it was for his son
to turn against him and rebel against him and die in the tree
in the battle. He knew the pain and he knew
that God's covenant rested upon God the Father going through
the same thing with his own son. What faith David had in this
covenant? What faith? Consider how Absalom
died. He was caught in the boughs of
that tree, his head caught in the tree. A picture of the cross
upon which Christ, the head of the church, was nailed. But as
he hung in the tree, Joab comes unto him and Joab, mindful that
the king had said, don't touch the young man, doesn't physically touch him
with his own hand. But Joab, seeking vengeance upon
this rebellious man Absalom, thrust three darts through his
heart and slew him. which brought great grief unto
David. But Absalom died with free darts
through his heart. A picture again of the covenant. His heart was pierced with free
darts. There were three persons of the
Godhead who made this everlasting covenant with David. The Father,
the Son and the Holy Ghost. They were all involved. And they
were all involved when Christ died. When Christ died and His
heart, as it were, was pierced. The Father was involved. The
Holy Spirit was involved and the Son Himself was involved.
There were free darts through His heart. Free darts. What a covenant. What David was taught, not just
through the Scriptures, not just through the Gospel as he heard
it from others, but through his own experience. He could write
movingly in the Psalms. He could write of this covenant
because he felt it himself. He felt what it was to be a recipient
of it. He knew his own sin and his own
rebellion, but he knew the loss of a son as the father lost his
son. This is what the loss of Absalom
taught him. In type and figure it pointed
him straight to the everlasting covenant. And in that covenant
and in his household and in the events of his household he knew
the distinctive elect in particular grace of God. God had made with
him an everlasting covenant and though not all his household
would be saved Although he had those like Absalom who had rebelled
against him, yet he knew that God's covenant with him stood. Although my house be not so with
God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, although
he make it not to grow. Even though God has chosen me
and not Absalom, even though there are those who he saves
and others who he doesn't, I know that he's chosen me. And I know
the electing grace of God. I know none deserve to be saved. I don't deserve it any more than
Absalom deserved it. I'm a sinner as much as my son
was a sinner. I'd have rather died in my son's
place. I'm more guilty than he is. Yet God chose me and saved me
and set his love upon me. And this is all my salvation
and all my desire. What a God! What a covenant,
what grace and what mercy. This covenant, David says, is
ordered in all things and sure. It's ordered in all things and
sure. There's nothing can break it.
There's nothing goes against it. God has decreed it from eternity. God has brought all things in
time and eternity to pass such that this covenant would be fulfilled
and such it would bring its purposes about. Christ came at the appointed
time in history. He was born of the seed of David. He was born of the lineage of
David as promised. He came at exactly the right
time in exactly the right place to fulfill everything that the
prophets wrote of him and he was rejected of men in the way
it was prophesied he would be and he was offered up as a sacrifice
in the way he should be at the time he should be and he died
in the way he should. All history moved and was written
and decreed to come about to this end. The empire of Rome
existed so that Israel would be ruled by Rome at the hour
at which Christ came into this world. All history exists for
the fulfillment and outworking of this covenant and all of this
is in order to save David. He hath made with me an everlasting
covenant, ordered in all things and sure. This covenant is ordered
in all things, within itself and without itself. The covenant
itself is ordered and decreed by God. God decided how it would
be, how it would be brought to pass, how he would send his son,
how his son would be made a man, how his son would live and die,
and how his son would be crucified, how he would die, how he would
bear the sins of his people, how he would be laid in the grave,
how he would rise again and ascend. All aspects of the covenant itself,
were ordered of God perfectly and decreed perfectly and none
of them can be broken. But also the covenant is ordered
in all things. All things that exist in this
world, all things that happen past, present and future are
according to this covenant. Everything that happened in David's
life was in order that this covenant should be fulfilled and come
to pass. The tragedy that David experienced
with Absalom was a part of the outworking of God to bring this
covenant to pass. The fall of David himself, when he committed adultery, and Abathsheba's husband murdered
and put to death in the battlefield. The tragedy and rebellion of
David's life, the fall of David, the sin of David, though wicked,
is nevertheless part of those all things which work together
for the good of God's people. All things that work together
for the good of David. All the things that work together
for the outworking of this covenant. David was a sinner in need of
salvation. David was shown his sin and felt
his sin. He felt his rebellion against
God. He felt his need of God. The
Spirit of God brought him down. The Spirit of God broke him and
showed him his sin and showed him his need of salvation. Everything
that David did, everything that David said, And everything that
David experienced, everything that was done or said by those
around him, those in his family, those in his armies, those in
his kingdom, those in the kingdoms outside Israel, everything in
the world was part of this covenant. This covenant was ordered in
all things. It was decreed and commanded
in all things. God from the beginning has constantly
said this shall be and this shall happen and that shall happen. When Eve disobeyed the commandment
of God in the garden and when Adam disobeyed and ate of the
fruit that he was commanded not to, this was part of God's decree
in the covenant of what should come to pass. When men grew up
in wickedness in the days of Noah and wickedness multiplied
upon the face of the earth such that God sent a great flood and
delivered Noah and his family in the ark, this was part of
the decree of God. When the nations rose up against
Israel throughout its history, this was part of the decree of
God. When Joseph was cast into a pit
and taken down into Egypt, And Jacob and his sons were then
eventually brought to dwell in Egypt and the people multiplied. And the Hebrews multiplied in
Egypt and they found themselves in bondage in Egypt. This was
part of the decree of God. When Moses was sent to bring
forth that people and led them through the wilderness. This
was part of the decree of God. the everlasting covenant. It
was ordered and commanded in all those events. It was sure
and certain in all those events. When Christ was born in Bethlehem
and King Herod sought his life and slew all the firstborn in
the kingdom and then Christ had to Jesus had to be taken by his
parents down into Egypt until it was safe to return to their
homeland. This was part of that covenant,
ordered in all things and sure. God decreed that this should
happen. It was part of his purpose. When the apostles preached the
gospel and knew the opposition and hatred of men, when Stephen
was stoned to death, when Paul and the other apostles ultimately
met their end, were put to death by those who hated them. For
Christ's sake, this was part of God's covenant and decree. And every event in history since,
and everything that happens in this world is all part of God's
purpose and will concerning Christ and His Gospel. It's all according
to this covenant ordered in all things. It's been ordered. The
covenant itself is ordered and arranged in perfection, but the
covenant, that perfect covenant, orders all history and all events. There's nothing that happens
which is not in relation to this covenant, in relation to the
will of God, in relation to the purpose of God, and in relation
to the saving of God's people through the offering of His Son
Jesus Christ upon the cross. No matter what circumstance or
event it is, Everything that is happening in society today,
in the world today, in the movement, the political movement, the social
movement, in the laws that are passed, in the evil things that
we see in the world around us. All the things that happen, all
the wars that come about, all the tragedy that comes about,
all the... taking off God's bands as it
were and ripping them asunder. All the rebellion of man against
Almighty God is all according to God's will and purpose and
all according to this covenant which is ordered in all things. It runs through all things. All things move and work according
to God's purposes in this covenant. then we are not to worry about
what we see. Our trust and our hope is in
this covenant. David knew tragedy outside, he
knew tragedy in his home and his household and his family,
and he knew tragedy and the tragedy of his own heart and sin within. He knew trouble within and without,
and yet he looked beyond all that he could see inside him,
all that happened and occurred in his household, and all that
happened and occurred in his kingdom and the world around
him. He looked beyond all these things by faith, through them,
to that everlasting covenant that God had made with him, ordered
in all things. and sure. And all this was his
salvation. This was all his salvation and
all his desire. And all these terrible events
that came about, even the loss of Absalom that moved him greatly,
he could see was part of God's purpose. He could see pointed
him to this gospel, pointed him to this covenant and was not
something Ultimately negative, but it was
part of those all things that worked together for good. Part
of that order of God in time and history that brought about
his eternal purposes. Something wonderful in the end
because God had a covenant which was being outworked in all events,
in the minutiae of David's life, and the minutiae of every believer's
life since, is made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered
in all things and sure. Do you know something of this
covenant? Has God opened your eyes to see something of what
you are by nature, a sinner like David, No matter how high your
station in life might be or how low your station in life might
be. No matter whether you are David
upon a throne or Mephibosheth sat at the king's feet. Mephibosheth begging at the gate
of the city. No matter whether you are a beggar,
a pauper, or whether you are the richest and greatest. No
matter where you are or who you are, you are a sinner, like Adam,
like David, like Absalom. You've gone astray, you've sought
God's kingdom, you've sought God's throne, you've turned yourself
against God, you've been at war with God. David knew it of himself,
he saw it in his son Absalom, and he saw God's great mercy.
in forgiving Him for all that He was and all that He did. Have
you seen yourself stood naked and exposed before God for what
you are? You can decorate yourselves before
other men. You can dress and act and speak
and talk in a certain way to make yourself appear one way,
to make yourself appear good in the sight of others. You can
lap up their applause like Absalom did. You can lap up the acclaim
of men and think that you must be great because of it. But God
sees what you are. God sees the wretched rebellious
sinner that you are like Absalom was and like David was. He sees
what you are inside. He sees what I am inside. Have
you stood naked before God exposed for all that you are knowing
that God sees you inside and out and knowing you're guilty
and the judgment of God should rightly come down upon your head.
And has God come unto you in the gospel and opened his gospel
up unto you and shown you an everlasting covenant that the
Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit have made and that they
have made with sinners like David. Has he made this covenant with
you? Has he said in spite of all that you are and all that
you've done I've taken it. I've taken your sin. I've taken
your rebellion. I've taken your warfare. And
I've laid it all upon my son, who became an Absalom in your
place, who went to war, and who died in a tree, and had free
dance for us through his heart. And I've mourned over the loss
of my son. I've cried because of him, Absalom,
Absalom, my son, my son. And he cried out unto me from
the darkness, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? He suffered, and I suffered when
he suffered. But we did it because of our
love for sinners. Has He shown you His love? Has
the Spirit of God come forth from the presence of the Father
and the Son and said, Behold the Son, and behold the Father
loveth the Son? Look at David, look at Absalom,
look at the Father, look at Christ, look at the Saviour crucified
in your place. Has He come unto you and said,
look at my everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure,
is this your desire? Is this your salvation? Are you sure that God loves you? Has He made Him known unto you?
as he's shown you the blood and said it's all over the blood
has washed away your every sin there's no more price to pay
no more judgement to come it's all over there's only righteousness
there's only everlasting life there's a great kingdom and inheritance
which has been prepared for you my son have you felt the sureness
and certainty of this? This covenant is ordered in all
things and sure, much of David's life was about loss and tragedy
and heartache, but throughout all the ups and the downs and
the tragedy that he experienced, the change, the loss and the
gain, one thing was sure. One thing was like a rock that
ran through it all. One thing was certain. It was
never taken away. This covenant, this everlasting
covenant, was sure. It was ordered in all things
within itself and it was ordered in all the things that David
ever experienced. It could never be taken away.
It could never move. It could never change. And as
such, David looked at it and looked through it unto his God
and his Saviour, and he said, this is all my salvation and
all my desire, to be one with my God, to be washed in the blood
of the sacrifice, to be secured by His covenant. Oh, the love
that God has for me. Oh, the love that He had for
His Son like I had for Absalom. Oh, what God gave for me. Absalom, Absalom, my son, my
son. And oh, what the Son of God did
in my place when He took the judgment and wrath of God against
my sin. My God, my God. Why hast Thou
forsaken Me? O may God open our eyes to what
we are and what He did in offering up His Son and what the Son did
in the darkness upon the tree. O may He open our eyes to that
event in history which changes everything, the only event that
matters. that Christ was crucified for
sinners. Do you know Him? Have you been
shown Him? Has God given you the faith that
comes from Jesus Christ to lay hold of Him and to know that
you are one in His covenant, that He has made with you as
He made with David an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things
and sure.