Tonight we'll be returning to
1 Samuel chapter 28. Chapter 28. Saul's rule is coming
to an end. His kingdom has, according to
the word of God, been given to another. And now that word is
being brought to pass, just as God said by the judge and prophet
Samuel. When he said to Saul, the Lord
hath rent the kingdom of Israel from thee this day and hath given
it to a neighbor of thine that is better than thou. And it would
seem that those words struck Saul and sat with him and as
he recognized David being recognized by the people and the success
that David had in executing the business of the king for the
kingdom. that he recognized this is the
man. This is the man that is given
the kingdom that's taken from me. But Saul disregarded the
word of the Lord repeatedly and he turned away from Samuel and
he stopped consulting Samuel. He stopped going to Samuel and
communing with Samuel because every time that he spoke with
Samuel, The words of Samuel were as a bright light that reproved
Saul of his sin. He was reproved because of his
sin and rather than repent, rather than be humbled and struck by
the word and to see his own sin and go to the Lord and ask for
forgiveness and mercy, he pushed on in his rebellion and he became
obsessed with trying to take David's life. He became consumed
with trying to take David's life. And it ultimately led to David,
his best general, his most loyal of subjects, to flee the land,
to leave that land. And because he was so focused
and so intent on destroying David, He abandoned and forsook his
own duties as a king, and it left his land, it left his people
naked and exposed to their enemies. And this, eventually, this rebellion
led to Saul not hearing from the Lord, and he tried to circumvent
He tried to gain the knowledge of God that he needed without
even going to God. That's what he tried to do. And
it turned, he turned to wicked inventions and it was the thing
that led ultimately to his utter destruction. His utter destruction. And so, David has become this
object of Saul's hatred. Saul wants to destroy him. He
persecutes him. And in this, David serves as
a picture of Christ to us. We see the Lord Jesus Christ
in this, and that's because David, he is the anointed king. He's the anointed king, chosen
of God to rule and lead his people Israel. And Saul hated him for
it. He hated him for it because David
was receiving all the glory, all the praise and honor of the
people. They rejoiced in David. They
loved David. And Saul coveted that praise. It's something we see in the
true religion, where Christ receives all the glory, all the praise
for our salvation, all our fruit, all our works are His works. It's what He has wrought in His
people and He receives the glory. And the natural man, who does
not have the Spirit of God, who doesn't have a new heart, who
isn't born again, despises Christ, despises Him receiving all the
glory, and he rebels against it. And so David's a picture
of Christ, and Saul is a picture of the natural man who, left
to himself, refuses the Word of God, rebels against the Word
of God, will not bow to the Word of God in truth, he'll bow to
an idle God, an idle Jesus, but he won't bow to the God of truth,
to the word of truth. And just as Saul blames God for
his problems, he doesn't blame himself, he doesn't look at his
own sin, he blames God for his problems. So the natural man
turns to wicked devices to try and gain some understanding about
what's going on and try to gain some comfort and understanding
for himself. And Saul here, he seeks to know
what he must do and can do to save himself. And all he gets,
as we'll see in this chapter, all he gets is an enumeration,
a recounting of all his sins, of all his rebellion and wickedness. And he's told, tomorrow you're
going to be dead. Tomorrow you and your sons are
going to die. And it proved not to be a comfort
to know these things. It was a distress to him. It
terrified him. It sapped him of all his strength. It exasperated his fears. So what is the Lord showing us
in this chapter? He's showing us that today is
the day of salvation. Today, if you will hear his voice,
harden not your hearts as the Israelites did in the provocation
when they came out of Egypt and fell in the wilderness, not entering
the promised land. We are to turn to God's anointed
king, to hear Christ, to bow to him because he is the rightful
king. He is the anointed of the Lord. So don't refuse the word of God
like Saul did. Don't fight against the word
of God like Saul did. It reveals the gracious will
and power of God to save freely by his grace in the person and
work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't turn to other means as
Saul did. It's only going to destroy you. That's what he's showing us here.
So let's begin in verses one and two. It came to pass in those
days that the Philistines gathered their armies together for warfare,
to fight with Israel. And Achish, king of the Philistines,
said unto David, know thou assuredly that thou shalt go out with me
to battle thou and thy men. And David said to Achish, Surely
thou shalt know what thy servant can do. And Achish said to David,
Therefore will I make thee keeper of mine head forever. So, providentially
here, David is residing with the Philistines. He's there in
the land of the Philistines, and this King Achish presumes
that because he's giving him aid in providing safety for him
from the hand of Saul, that David will provide him a service, which
he's now calling upon him to do. Now, David's answer is actually
very ambiguous. We don't know what David was
going to do. We don't know whether or if David
knew what he was That is not revealed here, and ultimately,
the Lord is not going to have David fight against Israel. He's
not going to raise his hand to harm or destroy Israel in any
way, because Christ would never harm his church. Even when he
chastens us and reproves us by his word, it's for our good.
It's never for our destruction. It's never to to harm us in any
way. And so God has a purpose in what
he's done, what he's providentially done, and it's because he's determined
to remove Saul from the kingdom. David needs to be out of the
way. David's not going to fail. Christ isn't going to fail. He
must be be put out of the way there, sidelined there, and Saul
is going to do everything he can to resist and fight against
the will of God, and it's going to lead to his destruction. The
Lord never said that Saul had to die, but the kingdom was removed. It's gone from him. You know,
Jonathan would have gladly bowed the knee to David and surrendered
to David, but not Saul. And it would destroy Saul and
destroy his sons. Now, let me repeat what I said
earlier. David is a picture of Christ. And when we oppose God's
word, it will appear. Sometimes the providence of God
will appear as though the face of God is determined against
us and opposing us and resisting us and is against us. That's
not the time to harden your heart. That's not the time to resist
the word of the Lord. That's the time for us to humble
ourselves, to be humbled by it, to hear the word, to receive
the rebuke, to receive the reproving, and be humble before the Lord.
Peter said it this way in 1 Peter 5, 5. Be clothed with humility,
for God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves, therefore,
under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due
time, casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you."
And we see this. Jonah was chastened of the Lord,
and Jonah thought that he could rebel against the Word of God.
that he could run away, and that God would not have any power
or be able to find him outside of Israel, or he thought he could
outrun him or something like that, or that God would just
give up on him. But the Lord threw him overboard
and swallowed him up with a fish, and he was humbled, and he was
brought low, and he confessed his sin. And it says, while he
was in the belly of the whale, they that observe lying vanities
forsake their own mercy. He observed, Jonah observed lying
vanities. He thought he could get away
from God. And he realized, I'm forsaking
my own mercy. What am I thinking in doing that?
But Jonah found grace in the sight of the Lord and Saul did
not. Saul didn't. Picking up in verse four and
five, and the Philistines gathered themselves together. and came
and pitched in Shunem. And Saul gathered all Israel
together and they pitched in Gilboa. And when Saul saw the
host of the Philistines, he was afraid and his heart greatly
trembled." And so here's what has come of Saul's hatred and
rebellion of rebellion against God and his hatred of David,
his constant pursuit is a picture of the natural man who seeks
to get Christ out of his life. Doesn't want to hear it. I've
heard that. I don't need to hear that anymore.
I don't even want to hear his name mentioned. And the more
he fights against it and resists it, If God wills, if he leaves
him to himself, he'll be just like Saul, and it will lead to
his utter destruction. The Philistines, like the sins
of our flesh, they've driven deep into the heart of Israel. Now, I don't, you know, you probably
don't know how the tribes of Israel were laid out in the land
of promise when they were given those tribes. But, you know,
Judah is the southernmost. It's at the bottom. And then
right above them would be Benjamin, where Saul would be from. And
these two cities are in Issachar, in the tribe of Issachar. And
so above Benjamin is Ephraim, above Ephraim is Manasseh, and
above Manasseh is Issachar. And if you look in your Bible
with a map, you would see that it's sort of a tall, slender-shaped
country. And it looks like a man. And
if it was a man, Issachar would be right about where the heart
of man would be in the body. That's about where it is. And
these Philistines were encamped in the very heart of man. There they are. And Saul goes
up there, and he looks over at the strength and the power of
the Philistine army, and he's afraid. And his body, his heart
trembles. His heart trembled greatly. Saul
had been at one time a brave man. When he first became king,
the Lord gave him another spirit. The Lord gave him another heart.
It was a spirit of bravery so that when the Ammonites first
attacked, when Saul was anointed king and it was announced that
he's the king, and there was a lot of people that weren't
happy about it. But the Lord stirred up the enemy,
the Ammonites, and gave Saul a spirit of bravery so that when
he heard what was done, he was angry, he assembled the people
together, and he defeated the Ammonites soundly, and then the
country, their heart was with him. Their heart was with him,
but now he doesn't have that spirit anymore. He's afraid.
He's not a brave man. He's not a man with heart. He's
a man who's a coward and who's afraid, who's afraid, who sees
that the kingdom is being taken from him. Verse six. And when
Saul inquired of the Lord, the Lord answered him not, neither
by dreams nor by Urim, which is the light from the stone that
the high priest would wear, and it signified revelation and truth. He received no truthful word
of revelation from the high priest. He received no word from the
prophets, but now that he's in danger, Now that things are going
bad, now he's afraid, and now he wants to hear from the Lord. But from what I can see is his
seeking the Lord was short-lived. It wasn't a true inquiry. It was just a superficial type
of inquiry, if you will, or it was a very poor attempt. And I say that because in 1 Chronicles,
which is also detailing this time of the kings, In 1 Chronicles
10, verse 13 and 14, we're told that Saul died for his transgression,
which we'll see, well, we'll see it being foretold, which
he committed against the Lord, even against the word of the
Lord, which he kept not, and also for asking counsel of one
that had a familiar spirit to inquire of it. Lord willing,
we'll see that tonight with the witch. And inquired not. of the Lord. And so the picture is there's
no importunate knocker. There's no shameless knocker
knocking on the door. Lord, save me. Lord, help me. There's none of that. Saul never
sought the Lord. He didn't humble himself. He
didn't beg God to forgive him or heal him. He turned from the
Lord. He turned away from the Lord,
and it cost him dearly. God is very gracious to those
who seek him. He's gracious. We read some of
that chapter there. In Psalm 107, and I'll just read
a few more, a few verses from it there. From verse 11, it says,
because they rebelled against the words of God and contend
the counsel of the Most High. Therefore, he brought down their
heart with labor. They fell down and there was
none to help. That's Saul. That's Saul. Just like us. That's us. And
that's Saul. We rebel against the word of
the Lord. We rebel against the light. We do despite the spirit
of grace when we sin willfully. Then they cried unto the Lord
in their trouble and he saved them out of their distresses.
He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death and break
their bands and sunder. Oh, that men would praise the
Lord for his goodness and for his wonderful works to the children
of men. Saul didn't believe that. And
Saul didn't inquire of the Lord. He maybe did a few things and
was like, well, see, he's not answering me. Saul wasn't seeking
God. Saul was blaming God and putting
it on him for not answering him. He blamed God. And, you know,
when you think about it, should we blame God for those times
where we grow cold and indifferent and forgetful and we don't pray
and we don't seek the Lord and we just go on for a time and
time. And what we do is just a cursory
going through the motions kind of thing. And then one day we
come into trouble. Should God answer us right away?
Is he not right to teach us and to instruct us and to show us
how great our need is and how foolish we are for being so indifferent
to the true and living God? He is gracious. And so even if
he chooses not to answer us in a way that we see right away,
it's for our good. It's to humble us. It's to bring
us low and to show us our ignorance in what we do. What we should
do is confess our sin and acknowledge that he's right not even to answer
us. That's how we should come to
him and confess, Lord, you don't owe me anything and I'm the fool
here, I'm the wicked one, I'm the one who's turned my back.
Lord have mercy on me. Confess your sin and he's very
gracious to us and he does that for his child because that's
how he brings us low in ourselves to learn that we do need him
every hour and that to this world is not gonna give us what he
alone gives his people. And so seeing how that God shut
him up To beg for mercy, Saul didn't hear it, and he just refused
God and went further on in his rebellion, and then he turns
to wicked devices. He's trying to gain God's knowledge
apart from God. He's trying to understand what
he should do without going to God. Is that going to work? No. Verse 7 says, said unto his servants,
seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit, that I may go to her
and inquire of her. And his servants said to him,
behold, there is a woman that hath a familiar spirit at Endor. Rather than saying, whoa, Saul,
we don't want to do that. Oh, yeah, we know someone. She's
in Endor. And that's the true nature of
Saul's heart being exposed there, really. He's quick to just turn
to a wicked way. And when the believer's way is
hard, and when in Providence God appears to have set his face
against us, all of God's answers seem to be, you know, it's as
if God's saying, go away. Go away. What are you doing here?
Why are you here now? What brings you here? Just leave. Peter's response is best. Lord,
to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal
life. And he said, we believe and are
sure that thou art the Christ, the son of the living God. And
even if God, even if it seems like God is saying go away, where
would the child of God go? Where can we go? But stay there,
waiting upon him, knocking on that door shamelessly. Shamelessly,
Lord, please. I don't have anywhere else to
go. He does that. He brings that out for us to,
he's proving that the faith we have is of him and keeping us
staying upon him. Saul knew that turning to a witch
and these dark arts, he knew it was wicked. He actually made
a law outlawing the witches and the sorcerers and wizards. He
made a law and so the proving of God here only proved that
Whatever Saul did, he didn't even believe it. He just was
doing it in an outward manner that had nothing to do with his
heart. And so when I was looking at
this, it struck me that if God is against you, there is no point
in turning to any wickedness, witchcraft, sorcery, astrology,
whatever. There's no point in turning to
that because if God's against you, there is no word or any
aid that you can get from a devil, there's no preparation you can
do that's going to deliver you out of the hand of God. Stay
upon the Lord because it may be that his mercy will receive
you, that he's just bringing you low and humbling you, that
he may be merciful to you. Why would you pursue lying vanities? That's to forsake our mercy,
as Jonah said. That's to forsake it. Likewise,
on the other hand, for believers, if God be for us, who can be
against us? No devil, no lie, no spell, no
nothing can harm us if you're the Lords of God for us. But
Saul presses on in his rebellion, verse eight, Saul disguised himself
and put on other raiment and he went and two men with him
and they came to the woman by night. And he said, I pray thee
divine unto me by the familiar spirit and bring me him up whom
I shall name unto thee. You know, he won't come to God
in the light, but he'll go through all the effort and the trouble
to disguise himself and put on other clothes like he's a common
soldier and travel by night and the precarious nature of traveling
by night. And that's what men do in wickedness. For everyone that doeth evil
hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deed should
be reproved. And that's why he's there going
by night. He doesn't want to be caught. He's the king. He
made a law against this. And, in fact, the Lord used this
woman to rebuke him, to remind him of what law he made. Verse
9, the woman said unto him, Behold, thou knowest what Saul hath done. How he hath cut off those that
have familiar spirits and the wizards out of the land. Wherefore
then layest thou a snare for my life to cause me to die. All right, now this woman cared
nothing for God and his righteousness. She wasn't interested in the
law of the Lord. She wasn't interested in his
word. All she cared about was the law of man and the punishment
that man would give her. And it shows us that the law
doesn't save us. The law doesn't turn this heart. The commandments of men, that
doesn't turn a heart. Even the law of God doesn't turn
the heart. What Saul said was right. But
he didn't believe it and she didn't believe it. And it just
shows us that we need a new heart. We must be made new creatures
by the Lord Jesus Christ. That's his work. That's what
he does to turn us from wicked works, from wicked ways, from
wicked devices, and the ignorance of the whole thing of it, right? To think that you can oppose
God and still get the answer of the wisdom of God through
some other means. It's vanity. It's vanity of vanities. But Saul tells her, You won't
be punished for this. Verse 10, Saul swear to her by
the Lord of all things, saying, as the Lord liveth, there shall
no punishment happen to thee for this thing. And that just
tells us how empty and vain man's promises are. If you've refused
God's righteousness through Jesus Christ and you think you can
come to God by some other righteousness, it's a lie. It's vanity. We cannot
be saved by lies. And if we turn to the dark arts
and trying to seek out hidden knowledge in what's going to
happen, it's going to do no good thing for us. It'll do no good
thing for us. They're lies, they're deceitful,
and all they'll do is bring us to eternal habitations and horrible
places. They're wicked works. Fortune
tellers, all that stuff, don't mess with it. You know, people
argue they're just harmless, they're just kids' games. No,
they're not. This don't have anything to do
with them. And you're not going to get any knowledge of God,
any true knowledge from those things. The only true and righteousness,
the only revelation is of God, is of Him. Verse 11, then said
the woman, whom shall I bring up unto thee? And he said, bring
me up Samuel. This is interesting because while
Samuel was alive, Saul didn't even go to him. Saul could have
gone to him. He knew where he lived. He was
still teaching in the prophet of the schools, and he lived
in Ramah, and he never went to him when he was alive, but now
he's seeking the living among the dead. Samuel's not there. Samuel's in the arms of God. He's in the bosom of the father
in Christ Jesus. And so he's not going to speak
to Samuel. And it says in verse 12, when
the woman saw Samuel, she cried with a loud voice, and the woman
spake to Saul, saying, why hast thou deceived me, for thou art
Saul? Now, I think the most profound
thing about this verse is what it doesn't say, and the silence
that the scriptures give us as to what she did to bring up Samuel.
You notice that it doesn't tell you how she did these dark arts. It doesn't even list them for
us. We don't know anything about
what she did and it tells us all that we need to know about
magic and witchcraft and sorcery and dark arts and things like
that. Don't touch them, don't entertain them, don't be curious
about them. If you think you're being exposed to it, turn away
from it, because it's all garbage. It's evil, it's vile, it's wickedness. And it reminds me of what the
Lord said in Revelation 2.24. But unto you, this is him speaking
to the church in Thyatira. And this church heard him, and
he said, as many as have not this doctrine, this wicked doctrine
of witchcraft, and which have not known the depths of Satan
as they speak, I will put upon you none other burden. It just reminds me that it's
a burden to dig into and know the depths of the wickedness
in this world. It's a burden. It's terrible.
It's horrifying when you hear of things. I don't want to know
it. I've heard all I need to hear, and I'm thankful that God
has put magistrates and governments and police officers and agencies
to deal with that stuff so that you and I, we don't have to.
I don't wanna look at that stuff anymore. I don't wanna hear that
stuff anymore. God has given us people to handle
that so that you and I may keep our eye upon Christ and look
to him and rejoice in him by all means, We know wickedness
is in the world, and that's why Christ, in the prayer that he
taught us, said, deliver us from temptation. Deliver us from the
evil. Lord, save us from that. I don't
need to know what it is you're saving me from, just that it's
wicked and it's not good for me. I don't want to know the
depths of Satan as they speak. I know it's occurring, so pray
to the Lord and ask him to destroy it out of the land and take it
away. But I don't need to know exactly what it is, and I don't
want to know what it is. He tells us what he tells us
to the degree he tells us for our good. As Paul said, I would
have you wise unto that which is good and simple concerning
evil. I'd rather set my heart on good
things. And I've seen things that just
are disturbing. I just don't want to do it anymore.
I don't want to see it anymore. And I know you know that. I'm
just encouraging you that we don't have to know it. We don't
have to know it. Amen. Now, this appearance of
Samuel is not Samuel. It's a, it's a lying spirit and
God permitted it. God permitted it. It reminds
me of, of Micaiah, the prophet. He's in first Kings chapter 22.
It's actually a very, um, interesting chapter. It's pretty amazing,
but, um, but he even tells Ahab, King Ahab of Israel, had Jehoshaphat,
I believe it was, a good king. It was one of the good kings
from Judah. Went up there and they had kind of a friendship
and they were working together and they were going to go to
war against a common enemy for Ahab, an enemy of Ahab's. And
Ahab had all these guys who didn't know the Lord. They were saying,
go, go, the Lord's going to bless you. And the king, I think it
was Jehoshaphat, Anyway, he said, isn't there a prophet of the
Lord here? He could tell there was no faithful prophet of the Lord.
And Ahab was like, I don't want to get this guy. He always gives
me negative things because he was always telling them the truth.
And he laid it out for him. Micaiah laid it out for him.
He told him that he saw a vision of the Lord on his throne and
all these spirits on the left and the right, the hosts of heaven.
And the Lord said, who will go? and bring Ahab up to that he
may go and fall at Ramoth Gilead. Who will persuade Ahab to do
this?" And one said this, another said that, and one said, I'll
go and persuade him. How so? I'll be a lying spirit in the
mouth of his prophets. And the Lord said, go, you'll
persuade him, and he'll do it. And Micaiah told him this, and
he still did it. It's not like the Lord hid it
from him. He told him exactly what he's doing, because it shows
us, it exposes what we are by nature, and how great our fall
is, and how desperate we are for the grace of God in Christ,
and how it's only his grace and power that delivers this wicked
heart. Don't turn from Christ. He's
our mercy. He's our salvation. He's the
grace of God for us. No other art or device is going
to do anything. Only Christ is salvation. all
showing us him. And so in verse at the end of
verse 15, Saul asked, make known unto me what I shall do. He wants to know what what he
should do to save himself. And the spirit that's talking
to him never answers that question. And that's because it shows us,
it teaches us you're never going to know that blessed word of
God, the truth and revelation of God. in truth, in Christ,
from any other device in this world. No matter where you turn
the TV, books, Not the word of God, of course, but I mean just
man's books and man's learning and man's art and man's device
and all the things of wickedness and even that which seems good.
We're never going to receive the revelation and truth of God
through anything but Jesus Christ. That's what it's shown us. He
wanted to know what can I do to be saved and he didn't get
that. at all. What he was told is,
God your enemy, these are all the sins that you've done to
make him your enemy, and you're going to be dead with me tomorrow. That's what he heard. And so
it was just a distressing thing. That's what it is. Whenever you
look to the things of this world to have some understanding of
God, that's all you're going to come away with is distressing
things that just upset you and hurt you. and defile you." And
Saul had been led astray by his temptation and now he's being
tormented by it. He's being tormented. Saul refused
the word of the Lord and suffered in his rebellion and just continued
to refuse it. And as we come to the end of
this chapter, picking up in verse 22, I think there's something,
again, in the light of Christ and in the light of the gospel,
in the light of what our Lord does for his people, I think
this food that she tells him to eat is a picture of the heavenly
bread that we need. It's a picture of that heavenly
bread. Verse 22, she said, let me set a morsel of bread before
thee and eat that thou mayest have strength when thou goest
on the way. All right, I'm just changing
gears a little bit here. But verse 23 says, he refused
and said, I will not eat. Now, I know this woman just wants
this king out of her house because if he dies there, there's probably
going to be some inquiry and she's going to lose her life
for whatever she did there in killing the king. But the picture
here is appropriate. The bread we need is the bread
of heaven. It's the gospel. And man refuses
to hear the gospel. He refuses the one thing that
declares the salvation of God, the very thing that we need,
that we're asking for. How can I be saved, right? What
do I need to do? And man refuses it, and he turns
to this world and its darkness and and he'll go through over
mountains through rivers through you know do all kinds of things
to to try and save himself like that like that what was it that
that general warrior from syria who came to elijah or elisha
and was told to dip himself in the river jordan that that stinky
little river jordan and he was angry and his and his Servant
said, if he had told you to go do this and that and all these
other big things, would you not have done it? And he was like,
yeah, I would have done it. And he said, but because he tells
you just go dip in the river, that you're upset about that?
It just shows what we are by nature. But he did, and he was
healed. But man will turn to the biggest things and do crazy
things, but to turn to God and to seek him for grace. That he
won't do. And he blamed God. In verse 15,
he kept saying, God's departed from me. He answers me not. And
he won't talk to me by the prophets or by dreams. And therefore,
I've turned to wickedness. Therefore, I called thee. That's
what he did. But it's not God's fault. God's
not to blame. It's Saul's fault. And if we
turn from the Lord, it's our fault. We're the ones who are
refusing his word, and we're the ones who won't humble ourselves,
bow the knee to God, confess, Lord, I'm the sinner. Lord, I
deserve this. I don't deserve you to even hear
me or acknowledge me, but Lord, have mercy upon me. If we would
but humble ourselves, it would be by the grace of God that we
do it, and the Lord would answer us. But this refusal of the bread
here, I believe it's a picture of the heart continuing to rebel
against God. And we want to know, what must
I do to be saved? And the gospel tells us, believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. And man won't hear that. And
he doesn't believe that simple word. He doesn't believe Christ.
He doesn't turn to Christ. He turns from Christ. Now we're
told in verse 23, his servants together with the woman compelled
him And finally he listened and he ate the bread. Now as a servant
of Christ and the bride of Christ, which is the church, as Paul
said, knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men,
we compel you, hear him, don't be turned to wicked devices. For the love of Christ constraineth
us because we thus judge that if one died for all, then we're
all dead. meaning that if Christ had to
give his life so much as for one sinner, then all sinners
were dead, otherwise Christ would not have come and laid down his
life. If men could save themselves,
he wouldn't have needed to come and save even one, because that
one could have been turned to whatever the others did and saved
themselves. But it shows that we all need
to hear this gospel. This is the only salvation, the
only way of salvation, to declare that God was in Christ, reconciling
the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, and
hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation." Meaning God,
sinner, God will be reconciled to you in Christ Jesus. That's where he meets with the
sinner. That's where he meets with his
people and freely receives them and blesses them and gives them
all that they need. He gives it all freely in Christ. That's why he sent his son. Don't
turn from him. Now then, we as ambassadors for
Christ, as though God did beseech you by us, we pray you in Christ's
stead, be ye reconciled to God. For God hath made him, Jesus
Christ, to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be
made the righteousness of God. in him. So there's no reason
for any sinner to continue in sin and in darkness and to turn
from the bread of life to dark ways and dark sayings and seek
out his relief from some other way. There's absolutely no reason
when God has provided so great a salvation freely in his son. Now we're told in verse 25, that
those Saul ate, that afterwards they rose up and went away that
night. That night. And again, it's just
a picture here. How sad a picture it is that
it shows us that he left in unbelief. He left with no relief. He left
with no comfort. He went away in utter darkness
without the light of Christ. And Peter tells us, ye do well
that ye take heed as unto a light that shineth in a dark place
until the day dawn and the day star arise in your hearts. Continue in the truth. Don't
be turned from the truth. It will never bless your soul.
It will never give you what you're seeking for salvation. Do not
be turned from the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't be so quick to
turn from him and think he's cut you off. when all he's doing
is humbling his child and bringing us low to see our need of him
and to discover and find how wonderful, how gracious, how
willing a Savior he is in Christ. And what he's saying to us is
to seek him. You that believe Christ, we have
the blessed hope of Christ, who hath delivered us from the power
of darkness and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear
son, in whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness
of sins. So wait upon the Lord, meaning
seek him, ask him, knock on that door shamelessly till he open
the door and give you all that you need to satisfy the justice
of God, the law of God, your stinging conscience. Seek the
Lord and wait upon him. He's willing to be reconciled
to all who come to him through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.