Alright, so we're going to be
in 2 Samuel chapter 1, the second half of the chapter there, and
we're looking at David's lamentation over the death of Saul and Jonathan. And I'm not going to spend much
time on this aspect, but let me just say that It is amazing
that David writes this lamentation concerning Saul, who's a man
that made himself an enemy to David, and sought to kill David,
and disparaged his name among Israel. And he persecuted David
for many years, many years, and turned many against him. And
we also see that this lamentation is not one that's found among
the Psalms, And it seems that perhaps it has something to do
with the fact that he's writing of these men here. And we also
can see that there's wisdom in David in writing this psalm because
of the fact that the kingdom was turned against him under
Saul's hand. And here, there was some that
really loved Saul. that loved him, that loved to
serve him and serve with him and fought for him. And there
were many that were still in favor of Saul. As we'll see later,
there were some that went after Saul's remaining son, but this
is a psalm or a lamentation rather written and with wisdom, because
it is uniting. It is uniting to those that would
be against David, and showing that he wasn't against Saul.
He never was against Saul, and he had some very nice things
to say about Saul here. And so it would make uniting
the kingdom under him just that much easier. But that's some
aspects of interest, I suppose, about these verses here. But what I want to take notice
of tonight is that there's a spiritual lesson being shown to us, being
brought forth to us in this passage here that speaks to what we are
by nature, that speaks to our fallen nature, that shows us
something of Adam's fall, that speaks to our fall in Adam, in
sin. And it also declares here how
that Christ redeemed us. We look at these things against
the truth that it's Christ who is the Mighty One. We ourselves,
in Adam, are fallen in sin. And we see that our enemies are
great. And yet Christ is the mighty
savior. He is the mighty God, Isaiah
called him. He's the mighty God who saves
his people gloriously by his death and by his resurrection.
Now there's three scriptures I just want to bring to your
attention here from this passage that are our focus tonight. So let's look first at verse
19, and we'll just read each of these. Verse 19 to begin.
The beauty of Israel is slain upon thy high places. How are
the mighty fallen? Now look down at verse 25. How
are the mighty fallen? In the midst of the battle, O
Jonathan, thou wast slain in thine high places. And verse
27, how are the mighty fallen? And the weapons of war perish. And so, this phrase you see there,
there's a repeated phrase, how are the mighty fallen? How are
the mighty fallen? Again and again, and it provides
us with pattern. It shows us what scripture is
teaching us, how that all are sinners. All are sinners. Flip
over to Galatians chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3 in verse
22. It says there, but the scripture
hath concluded all under sin. that the promise by faith of
Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe." So we see
here how the mighty Saul and even Jonathan, Jonathan the well-beloved
son, a man who in the estimation of other men was a good man,
a good man, and he was slain in battle, right alongside his
father Saul, who was a persecutor of David. But they died together.
They died together. And it shows us something about
man by nature, that we are all sinners, all guilty of sinning
against the true and living God, all guilty of breaking that law
which was given to Adam in the garden. This is to show us that
we are to put no confidence in man. We are to put no confidence
in this flesh. We are to put no confidence in
our works of religion or our works of righteousness or what
we have done to make ourselves or try to make ourselves acceptable
to God. You cannot do it. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. And though we strive and labor
and are sincere and mean well, trying to save ourselves by the
works of the law, by the form of religion, by the things that
we do or don't do or say or don't say, we will always come up short. We cannot save ourselves. And
so rather than trusting what man can do, our Lord is showing
us the beauty, the sufficiency, the fullness of the salvation
of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's to turn us from this flesh
that we would find our all in the Lord Jesus Christ. So with
that in mind here, this phrase, how are the mighty fallen? The first way in which we see
the truth of these words is in regards to Adam, our first father,
Adam, that one from who we all come. Our God made Adam, and
he put him in the garden that he had made. And when he made
Adam, Adam was upright. There was no sin in Adam. He didn't have a sinful nature.
He didn't have a nature bound with the lusts that we have and
know today. in our hearts, in our thoughts,
in our ways. And we're told back in Genesis
chapter one, in verse 27, that God created man in his own image. In the image of God created he
him, male and female created he them. And then God gave this
man a commandment. He gave him a commandment in
Genesis chapter two, verse 16 and 17. It says the Lord God
commanded the man saying, of every tree of the garden, thou
mayest freely eat. But of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it. For in the day
that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die." And after
that, the scriptures tell us that God made Adam a wife, a
helpmeet. And then Adam was the head of
his wife. And Adam told her. He doesn't say where he did it,
but he had to have told her the commandment of God. He explained
to her, this is what the Lord our God has given to us. And
what he said, don't touch. Well, he said, don't eat this
fruit from this tree here. But the woman, being deceived
by the serpent, She ate and transgressed the law of God. And then Adam
willfully transgressed the law of God. He went after her in
eating that fruit. He didn't trust the Lord. He
rebelled against God and plunged himself and all his seed in him
into sin and ruin. By his deed, he plunged us all
into sin. And their eyes, now being opened,
were told that they saw that they were naked. And so they
went and gathered up fig leaves, and they plucked them off the
vine, and they sewed fig leaves together to cover their nakedness. Now, this is a picture of man-made,
freewill religion. This is the religion of man,
of what he's hoping in. that by his works, he can fix
what he's broken. By his works, he can undo the
damage that he's done. They turned to the works of their
own hands. When they went to those fig leaves,
they snapped them off the vine, and they sewed them together
to cover their nakedness. They used dead things. When you
take something off the vine, It's now dead. It's no longer
living on its own. It's a dead thing. And it pictures
our dead works that man turns to by nature to fix himself,
to heal himself, to cover his sin, to atone for his sin, to
right his wrong. And it's dead works that are
not pleasing, not living, not acceptable to God. And then they
heard the voice. of God, walking in the garden
in the cool of the day. And what did they do? Did they
run to him and confess their sin? No, they ran from God and
hid themselves among the trees. And it showed that man is dead. Spiritually, that fellowship
was broken. He now saw God as his enemy.
He feared God, and he ran from him and hid himself. That's the
nature of man, and we see that pictured for us in Adam. How are the mighty fallen? Adam had all dominion over the
birds of the air, the beasts of the field, the fish of the
sea, over the ground. He had dominion over all those
things, and now he sold himself into slavery for nothing, got
nothing out of it. nothing out of it, except for
a head full of lies and seeing God as his enemy. So the point
of emphasis in all this is that, well, here's the problem, is
that we, brethren, you and I, we're all born of Adam's seed.
That seed is corrupt, defiled seed. And when Adam sinned, He
became corrupt and defiled, and all his seed in him send in him."
We all come forth now born of that corrupt seed. And that image
that he bore of God is defiled. And so we've ruined that. We've ruined that image. It's
defiled in sin. It's ruined in sin. Paul tells
us in Romans 5, verse 12, that by one man, and he's talking
about Adam, by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin. And so death passed upon all
men for that all have sinned. And that's true of us physically,
Adam's cells began to die right away, I'm sure, and he began
to die immediately, physically, though it couldn't be seen. But
the spiritual death was apparent very quickly when he ran to cover
his nakedness and ran from God. It showed that he's spiritually
dead in trespasses and sins. And so that's what the natural
man does by nature. Everyone that doeth evil hateth
the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should
be reproved. That's the testimony of scripture.
And the other testimony is that you that do come to the light
have only God to thank and praise for, because it's brought in
you of God's grace, of God's power. of what he does to save
you and turn you. Because by nature, we don't go
to the light. By nature, we don't come to Christ.
By nature, we don't confess Christ. We don't seek God. There's none
that seeketh after God, no, not one. There's none righteous.
There's none good. And it's only by God's grace
that we are turned from dead things. Solomon wrote this about
man. In Ecclesiastes 7.29, he tells
us that God hath made man upright. but they have sought out many
inventions. Adam was made upright, but after
that, when he sinned, he sought out inventions, and all his seed
after him were all very clever, very witty, very tricky, very
conniving, very deceitful by nature, by nature. And the prophet
Isaiah confessed, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have
turned everyone to his own way. Not the way, not the truth, not
the life, who is the Lord Jesus Christ. We've turned to our own
way by nature. Paul describes believers, and
by believers I mean those following Christ, those that have heard
Christ, confessed Christ, and follow him. Seek to know him
by his grace and power. All those have been quickened
who were dead in trespasses and sins. None of us has any corner
on life as though we never were sinners, that we had it all together,
that we were good, and that's why God chose us. That's not
the testimony of Scripture. God doesn't choose those that
are good and righteous in themselves. Christ came to save sinners.
He came to save sinners. And that was the problem that
the Pharisees had with him. This man eateth with sinners
and publicans. And they thought that was a shameful
thing to say of him. And yet we love him for it. We,
that are sinners, have been shown our sin and see our sin and are
thankful for his grace and mercy. We rejoice that he sits and eats
with sinners, that he is gracious to and merciful to to save us
from our sins. And so our Lord told Nicodemus,
he must be born again. And this is what I'm driving
at here, is that because we are born of Adam's corrupt seed,
Christ said, you must be born again. You're dead. That seed
is defiled. You can't know me. It's why he
said, except a man be born again, he can't even see the kingdom
of God. There could be a more eloquent preacher up here speaking
in place of me, and that won't save you either. It's not our
eloquence. It's not our abilities. It's
not my talent or your abilities or your intelligence. It's the
power and grace of God to come upon sinners, dead in trespasses
and sins, to seek out the lost who were redeemed by Christ,
chosen of God, and Christ spilled His blood for them to seek them
out in grace. and to deliver them out of the
darkness, out of death, to raise them to newness of life in Christ
by a new birth. And so until a man is born again,
he will not see his ruin in Adam. He will not see the plague of
sin that fills his heart. Sure, he'll recognize a few things
about him. Most people will say, yeah, I'm
not the best guy, but I'm not as bad as him. We're always looking
to prove that we're better than others. But Christ is saying,
no, you're born of Adam's seed. And you can't know me, except
you be born again. And that is the grace of God
to give us a new birth. not by something we've done,
not by our decision or our choice, but God in sovereign grace and
in power, making his word effectual in our hearts, delivers us, raises
us from the dead and brings us out of that death, makes us to
hear Christ and gives faith in our hearts to believe him. That's
a new birth, which he does. being born of Christ's incorruptible
seed. That's the new birth is we're
born again of Christ, of his seed, generated of his seed. We all came forth of Adam's dead
seed, now we are born again. His people are born again of
Christ's incorruptible seed. And so looking at ourselves,
how are the mighty fallen? We fell in Adam, and we all come
forth as sinners in Adam, dead in trespasses and sins. But God
did not leave salvation in the hands of his people. He didn't
leave it to us. If man could have saved himself,
Adam's works of covering his nakedness with the fig leaves
would have done it. It would have been sufficient. And God
would have said, that's good. Well done. Good thinking there.
That's pretty sharp of you there. Pretty witty. Pretty clever.
But no. He went and slew two beasts, and spilled their blood,
and took their skins, and covered their nakedness. A picture of
Christ, the Lamb of God, who should come. who would spill
His own blood and cover us with His righteousness, so that we're
not naked and standing before God, coming in the blood of Christ,
we're received of Him graciously for Christ's sake. And so that's
all God saves by promise, graciously by his promise. And the promise
I'm speaking of is in Genesis 3.15. That's where Christ was
declared there to Adam and Eve. When he told the serpent right
in front of Adam and Eve, he said to the serpent, I will put
enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed. It shall bruise thy head, and
thou shalt bruise his heel." And so this is the promise that
God would send His own Son. This is the promise of Christ
that He would come, not being born of Adam's corrupt seed.
That's why Christ had to be born of a virgin. because Adam's seed
is corrupt and defiled. He was born of the woman's seed
by the overshadowing of the Holy Ghost in him, the Son of God
taking upon him flesh, the likeness of his brethren, in order to
save his brethren, to be merciful and gracious to his brethren,
to deliver us from our sins. And so he came forth to destroy
the works that the devil had done there in the garden. So
salvation, brethren, the good news is that salvation is accomplished. It's an accomplished work. Christ
successfully redeemed all his people. He did it alone on the
cross. All we forsook him, all we fled
from him, he did it alone. Because salvation is of the Lord,
Jonas said. It's of the Lord. It's not of
Christ plus me and you. It's of Christ and Christ alone.
He's the Alpha, the Omega, the Beginning, the End, the First,
and the Last. He does salvation all from beginning
to end. Brethren, we glory in Him. In
Him. That's why Paul said that of
God, in 1 Corinthians 1 verse 30 and 31, of God are ye in Christ
Jesus, who has made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification
and redemption, that according as it's written, he that glorieth,
let him glory in the Lord. All right, he did it all, brethren.
He did it all. And so all his lost, fallen sheep
and Adam by the grace and power of God, according to promise,
shall come to faith in Christ. Because, Ephesians 1, 5, God
hath predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus
Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will. Not according to our works, not
according to our decision, not according to our freewillism,
but according to his will. according to His own good purpose,
as it pleased Him, to save whom He will. Listen to Colossians
2.13, And you, being dead in your sins, in the uncircumcision
of your flesh, hath He quickened, that is, made alive, together
with Christ, having forgiven you all trespasses. And so God
reveals those for whom Christ died by revealing faith in them. You that believe have only God
to thank for. We don't go around boasting of
what we did for Jesus. We talk about what the Lord Jesus
Christ did for me, a sinner. How that he saved me. How that
he wouldn't let me go. How that he delivered me from
my way, my lost way, and brought me into the way of his grace,
and salvation, and mercy, and light, and forgiveness. And so
we see, our Lord, how are the mighty fallen, but God has provided
a sure and certain salvation through the giving of his only
begotten Son, and it's only through Christ that we are made more
than conquerors through him that loved us. It's of his grace,
brethren. And then next, in considering
how the mighty are fallen, we've seen it in Adam, and we see ourselves
in Adam, and then we see how that Christ defeated and brought
down all our foes, all our enemies, all that stood against us, and
that we couldn't fight and battle off. The devil is a mighty foe
too mighty for us. to defeat, but not for Christ.
Christ is our strong man. Christ is our man of war. Christ
is the captain of our salvation. Christ is the Savior. He's Lord,
and defeated all our enemies. With regards to our Lord's people,
we're told in 1 John 3, verse 8, he that committed sin is of
the devil, for the devil sinneth from the beginning. Well, we've
got a problem. Because we're sinners, right?
We got a problem. We are sinners. He that commiteth
sin is of the devil. That's what he's telling you
there. Well, for this purpose, the Son of God was manifested
that he might destroy the works of the devil. And that's exactly
what Christ Jesus did. He came and destroyed the works
of the devil. He accomplished salvation for
his people. So we've got enemies, but Christ,
the Savior of his people, overthrows, overcame all our enemies, overcame
the world, overcame the devil, overcame the grave, overcame
death, overcame sin for his people. And that's how we are conquerors
in Christ, in him. So the first one here that we
consider is the serpent, that devil, whose murderous ways brought
death into the world. in deceiving Eve and in the death
of man. And we're told in Hebrews 2,
verse 14 and 15, Hebrews 2, for as much then as the children
are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took
part of the same, that through death he might destroy him that
had the power of death, that is the devil. and deliver them
who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to
bondage. You think about that before we
knew Christ. When we were thinking that it
was God weighing our works, are you good enough? No, you're not
measuring up there. We were laboring in bondage,
fearful of dying, because we saw there's lusts and sin just
in my heart and my thoughts and my ways and my flesh here. But
now that Christ has come, we couldn't save ourselves, but
by the grace of God through the Lord Jesus Christ, we see that
our inheritance is in his hand, our lives are in his hand, and
though we see sin in our members, right, which we would be rid
of. If we could be rid of it, we would be, but we can't. We
still see it in our members, yet we have faith and confidence
in the Lord Jesus Christ to save us to the uttermost by his grace
and power. That we're not looking at how
good I'm doing today. Am I doing a little better than
yesterday? That's not the measuring stick. That's not how you know
whether or not you have inheritance of eternal life. You keep looking
at yourselves, you're going to be miserable. and drive yourselves
nuts, you keep looking to Christ. Keep looking to Him. When you
see sin in your members, when you're troubled and tempted by
sin, cry out, Lord, save me. Have mercy on me. Lord, turn
my mind from these things. Lord, save me. I don't want to
be like this. I don't want to be a jerk on
the road. I don't want to do the things that I do all the
time. Save me, Lord. Have mercy. And so we keep looking
to him, keep turning to him, because salvation is of the spirit
of his grace, not of our works. Not of our works. You're going
to have some good days, and then you're going to fail. And if
you're looking at you, there goes all your hope and confidence.
It's right down the tubes with your works of wickedness. You
keep looking to Christ and beg him for mercy. Ask Him for grace. Ask Him for forgiveness. And
He gives it. He gives it freely. He says, I'll be sought of you
for these things. We are forgiven. We are saved. But He gives us
a heart to seek Him. He gives us a heart to see our
sin and a desire to serve Him faithfully in righteousness,
in His righteousness, trusting Him. Christ delivered us from that
fear of death because our hope isn't in what we see in ourselves.
We don't always see what we think we should see in ourselves. We
don't. But we know that when he comes,
we shall be made like unto him, for we shall see him as he is,
the Apostle John says. So our Lord came as our federal
head. Adam is called the federal head.
He represented all of men, all men in him. Well, Christ is also
a federal head, and he came and represented all in him, all his
people in him. And so he fulfilled all righteousness,
and thereby we are made righteous in him. Adam's also called the
seminal head. We're born of his seed, of his
corrupt seed. Well, all in Christ, he's our
seminal head. We're born of his seed now, of
his incorruptible seed, Peter says, of his incorruptible seed. And so he fulfilled all righteousness
for us. He's the one who's faithful to
the Father in all things, in perfect righteousness under the
law. He sacrificed himself under the
Father to make an atonement for our sins. He died and was buried,
and he was raised from the dead on the third day according to
the Scriptures, in fulfillment of all prophecy. And then having
risen and revealed himself to his disciples and given them
the commission to go and bear witness of these things to all
men, he ascended to the Father and is seated at the right hand
of the throne of God and has sent down his Holy Spirit to
seek out his people who gives us the new birth in Christ. Whereby
in the day of his grace he calls us out of darkness into the light
and life of Christ. And so being born again, that's
how we now know the mystery of God. For the longest time, I
always kept looking back to the law, treating this book like
it was a how-to manual to save myself. But by grace, he's now
shown us the mystery of God in Christ, how that God never intended
for us to be saved by the law, but to show us our sin by the
law, that we might find our all in the Lord Jesus Christ, in
him, in him. And so in the Lord Jesus Christ,
we are given a new heart, a new spirit now to know him. And he
promises that when he comes again, he shall give us a new body,
raised incorruptible, raised incorruptible. And so Paul said
of this, he said, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep.
But we shall all be changed. This is in 1 Corinthians 15,
if you want to turn there. 1 Corinthians 15. You should
go there. I'll read it. And we'll pick
up in verse 51 toward the end of the chapter there. 1 Corinthians
15, verse 51. Well, we'll pick up in verse
52 now. He says, we'll all be changed when Christ comes in a moment. Verse 52, in the
twinkling of an eye, at the last trump, for the trumpet shall
sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we
shall be changed. For this corruptible, what you
see here, this sinful flesh here, must put on incorruption, and
this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall
have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on
immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written,
death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting?
O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, and
the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth
us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved
brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work
of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labor is not in
vain in the Lord." And this is showing us that all our enemies,
as mighty as they are, as undefeatable as they are by us and our strength
and our works and our wisdom and our ability and our righteousness
of this flesh. We can't defeat them, but they're
destroyed by Christ. He overcame the devil, destroyed
his works. He overcame sin and the grave
and death through sin. He overcomes the world in us. He takes us out of the way of
the world so that we look to Christ and trust Him. And so
there's a battle now within you and within the heart of man. And the question for us, what
the Lord is revealing to us is, do I hear? Do I hear Christ? Do I believe? Am I a sinner? You that are sinners, know that
through this man, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, come
in the flesh, is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins.
Look to Christ. Look to Him. Believe on Him. And you that believe, that is
the witness of God in you, that Christ has done this for you,
in grace and in mercy, not because you deserve it, not because you
earned it. It wouldn't be grace then, it
would be works. But in grace, he reveals and saves sinners,
plucking them out of the fire, delivering them from death. One
could be sitting right next to you, and they believe and don't
believe. And you believe and they don't
believe, or vice versa. God chooses whom he will. As
he said to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy.
I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then,
Paul said, it's not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth.
Works. but of God that showeth mercy."
And that's what we're crying out, Lord have mercy on me. And
that is the heart cry that he gives to his people to whom he
has given life. First comes life, then comes
the cry. He gives life. We don't know it yet because
we're still in a great deal of darkness, but that darkness falls
away under the preaching of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ,
who strengthens the inner man, who feeds the inner man, who
nourishes the inner man that he's created in you, born of
his seed, through the preaching of the gospel. And so, you won't
be saved by this flesh. David warned of man's pride,
and he warned us not to trust in the strength of man. I was
going to go over verse 21. I'll just quickly say verse 21
back in 2 Samuel 121, ye mountains of Gilboa, Let there be no dew,
neither let there be rain upon you, nor fields of offerings.
For there the shield of the mighty is vilely cast away, the shield
of Saul, as though he had not been anointed with oil. And we
saw the last time, when we were still in 1 Samuel, how that Gilboa
was a swelling, rising mount, with a fountain of bubbling water
coming up. And it pictures pride. It pictures
the pride of our nature, and that's where he died, on that
mount of pride. And David said, let there be
no dew, neither let there be rain upon you. And that dew of
heaven pictures the spiritual blessings of God and the Lord
Jesus Christ. And what the Lord is recording
here for us is that he doesn't bless our pride. He doesn't bless
man's wrath. He doesn't bless man's ways.
He blesses us in and for the Lord Jesus Christ. That's where
we're blessed. That's where we are delivered
from death and sin. That's where we're helped and
comforted and healed and kept and provided for. in Christ,
because God resisteth the proud but giveth grace to the humble. And he makes us humble. He knows
how to strip us down and humble us in ourselves and take us down
from our stand in pride that we might find our all in Christ. And then that shield of faith
which is mightily and vilely cast, of the mighty is vilely
cast away, that's because pride gives no place to faith. When
you're proud and arrogant and puffed up in yourselves, you're
not leaning on the Lord, you're not trusting in, there's no faith
in Christ there, you're trusting in yourself. You're strong in
yourself, and that's where the shield of faith, with which you
extinguish the fiery darts of the devil, by faith, that shield
is cast away. And you're just an open target
for the fall. Just an open target. But in grace,
our Lord says, my sheep, hear my voice. He comes. There are
times where he lets us fall. There are times where he allows
us to see what we are by nature to humble us again, to bring
us low in ourselves, that we would hear his voice and follow
him and go not in our way, but in the way of Christ. And so,
brethren, that's the hope that we have here. In Christ we have all that we
need in Him and I pray the Lord bless that word to your heart
so that He give you faith in Christ to look to Him and trust
Him. Amen.