Good evening. Let's be turning
to 1 Samuel chapter 17. We won't look at the whole chapter,
but in this chapter we meet with the mighty foe of Israel, a man
named Goliath. And we see David's victory over
him. I want to look at the opening
verses with you. tonight, and without a doubt,
this victory of David is a picture, it's a foreshadow of our Savior,
our Lord Jesus Christ, who gained the victory over all our enemies,
all our foes, and he defeated him, the devil, and destroyed
his works and set his people free, delivering us from bondage
and servitude to that evil one, in sin and in death, in that
body of sin. So let's begin in verse one and
two. Now the Philistines gathered
together their armies to battle, and were gathered together at
Shoko, and that means a hedge, it's a city that means a hedge,
which belongeth to Judah, and pitched between Shoko and Ezekiah
in Ephes-damim. And Saul and the men of Israel
were gathered together and pitched by the Valley of Elah, which
means a strong tree, like an oak. You know, a mighty oak,
a great tree, a great oak. Sometimes in the Bible, you'll
see the word terrabinth, and what it's describing is a strong,
mighty tree, like an oak. And they set the battle in array
against the Philistines. So each side took up their positions
of strength. Verse 3, And the Philistines
stood on a mountain on the one side, and Israel stood on a mountain
on the other side. And there was a valley between
them. And there went out a champion
out of the camp of the Philistines, named Goliath of Gath, whose
height was six cubits and a span. You may recall when we were looking
at 1 Samuel chapter 14 that it was Jonathan who stood between
the two camps. And there were two sharp rocks
on either side. And we saw how that was a picture
of the salvation of our Lord, Jonathan being a picture of Christ
there, who stood between two sharp rocks. One rock was bozes,
and the other one sine. And bozes means shining or a
glistening white. And that was the one near the
Philistines. And the other one where Israel
was, was Sinai, and that means thorny. And we saw how that's
a picture that if Jonathan had withdrew and gone back to the
camp, then Israel will not have been saved that day. There would
have been no deliverance for Israel that day. And that picture
is like our Lord. If Christ did not go forward
and face the enemy, to deliver his people, then his people would
not have been delivered. And they would have remained
under that thorny way, meaning the curse, right? Because when
Adam sinned, God cursed the ground and said, it's going to produce
thorns and thistles and bramble bushes for you now. It's not
going to produce fruit, grapes and figs for you, except by the
sweat of your brow. And he said that the ground is
cursed. And so if Christ withdrew, we'd remain under that curse.
But he went forward. He went to that cross willingly,
that cross shining brightly, not for his own sins, but for
the sins of his people to make a righteousness, a glistening,
white, bright, shining righteousness for his people. And that's what
he did. And that's what we saw there
in chapter 14. And so now we come to something
very similar, a similar description there. And it's no accident,
I don't think it's an accident at all, that Goliath comes now,
this towering enemy of Israel, and he comes in a manner that
imitates what he saw done before. when the Lord gave his people
a great and mighty victory. But Jonathan, when Jonathan went
there, he prayed and asked the Lord to give him the victory. He depended wholly upon the Father
to give Him that victory, just like our Lord did. He depended
entirely upon the Father's word to Him, that He would raise Him
from the dead, that He would justify Him before all people. He trusted the Father, just as
the Father trusted us to the Son, the Son trusted the Father
in all things, and He brought our salvation and our deliverance. And so it's no accident now that
Goliath comes in that same manner imitating how the Lord saved
his people, except Goliath here doesn't have good designs. He
wants to destroy the people of God. He wants to destroy the
people of God. And this is not the only time
that we see evil imitating God and imitating the gospel and
imitating that which is of the Lord. Evil tries to imitate that. Satan wants to take the place
of God, if he could, but he can't. He wants to be as God, but he
can't do it. Turn over to Proverbs chapter
9 and we'll see this, this imitation. Proverbs chapter 9 and verse
1, it's in the same chapter, we'll see both of these. this
imitation. So here is wisdom. Wisdom hath
builded her house. She hath hewn out her seven pillars. Now this of course is speaking
of the Lord Jesus Christ who is made unto the people of God
wisdom. That's 1st Corinthians 1.30.
Our God has made Christ unto us wisdom. He's the wisdom of
God. By Him we know the true and living
God. We have understanding. And He's the one who builds the
house. We're in the house of the Son.
He's the one that builds this house. It's of the glory and
praise of His name. He's our wisdom and He leads
us in paths of righteousness. Verse two, she hath killed her
beasts. This is wisdom. She hath mingled
her wine. She hath also furnished her table. And what this speaks of is the
redemption of Christ, that everything He did to redeem His people was
done justly. What Christ did is just, righteous,
holy, perfect. We can find no fault in what
he did. In other words, it goes back
to what he said in John 10, when he said, I'm the good shepherd,
and the good shepherd enters through the door. That's how
you're supposed to enter a place, through the door. You don't go
over the wall. You don't come in through a window.
You don't go in some other way. You go through the door. Christ
goes through the door. A thief and a robber, they go
over the wall. They come in another way. And
that's what the devil did in the garden, right? He came in
over the wall. He's not the shepherd. He didn't
enter through the door. He didn't do what he did justly.
What he did was wicked and evil. But everything Christ does is
perfect, and that's what's being declared there in verse 2. The
beast was killed, so to speak. The wine was mingled correctly. The table's furnished, and there's
no wrong in it. Christ redeemed his people justly. Justly. So that the Father is
just to forgive us our sins. That's what Romans 3, 24 through
26 tells us. being justified freely by His
grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom
God had set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, meaning
that the Father sent Him to turn His wrath, which was against
us, away from us, upon Him, and so set us free. delivered us
from the hand of justice through faith in his blood to declare
his righteousness for the remission or forgiveness of sins that are
passed through the forbearance of God. To declare, I say at
this time, his righteousness, that he might be just and the
justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. God is just to forgive
us of our sins, because Christ paid the price. He satisfied
justice. He delivers his people. So God
is just. And that's what's said there.
Now, back in Proverbs 9, 3, she hath sent forth her maidens.
She crieth upon the highest places of the city. Whoso is simple,
let him turn in hither. As for him that wanteth understanding,
she saith to him, come. eat of my bread and drink of
the wine which I have mingled. And so the maidens, a picture
of the church, they lift up their voice with the voice of our Lord. And we proclaim the gospel of
our God, because that's how he blesses his people. That's how
he delivers his people out of death, out of darkness. He gives
them the gospel. And he gives them his spirit.
And then what does it say in Luke 24? Then opened he their
understanding that they might understand the Scriptures. That's
what our Lord did. I think it's verse 48. Our Lord
has opened our understanding by His grace all through the
blessings of His redemption that we would understand this is what
God is saying here. He's pointing us to Christ, our
salvation. He's declaring Christ to us all
through the Scriptures and we understand the Scriptures in
seeing Christ. and looking for him. And that's
how we know what our Lord is teaching us. He's turning us
to Christ. And so the gospel is, come, eat of my bread, the
bread of heaven. Drink of the wine which I've
mingled, the shed blood of Christ. Forsake the foolish and live,
and go in the way of understanding. And so this speaks of Christ.
This is declaring to us the gospel of Christ. Now, look at the evil
one and the imitation of what we just read there. Proverbs
9 verse 13. A foolish woman is clamorous. She is simple and knoweth nothing.
And clamorous means that she's demanding, she's never satisfied,
she's always complaining about something. That's a clamorous
woman. She's just complaining and just demanding her husband,
do this, do that, go do this thing, stop that. For she, but
it's a picture of the devil, of the enemy. It's a picture
of the false gospel and the false church. For she sitteth at the
door of her house on a seat in the high places of the city.
This is the false church with a false gospel, but she's trying
to make herself look like the true church. She'll throw up
a steeple, she'll have crosses, stained glass, a pastor, robes,
incense, candles, pews, hymnals, Bibles. She'll have all those
things to look like she's the true church. And she calls passengers
who go right on their ways. And here's what she says, who
so is simple, let him turn in hither. And as for him that wanteth
understanding, she sayeth to him, stolen waters are sweet,
and bread eaten in secret is pleasant. See, she's a liar and
a deceiver. And she's turning those who would
go the way of righteousness astray by a false gospel. All the outward
things look like the same thing. Look just like the other lady,
even sat in high places, but her message, her word, her gospel
is a false gospel. And our Lord even warned the
Pharisees, the Pharisees who were religious, who read the
scriptures, who spoke from the scriptures, and yet they didn't
know the truth, and they rejected Christ. Woe unto you, he said,
scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye shut up the kingdom of
heaven against men, for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer
ye them that are entering to go in. And that's what this clamorous
woman does. By this false gospel, she turns
men astray from entering into the truth. And so this false
church does so pretending to be the church, imitating everything
she can. She sits in the high places of
the city. She's got a word for the simple.
She appeals to those who want understanding. But then she tells
them wicked lies and deceit. And she leads them to death and
destruction. And that last verse there in Proverbs 9, 18, but
he knoweth not that the dead are there, and that her guests
are in the depths of hell. And so it all comes down to not
whether you look like you're the true church on the outward,
but do you have the gospel? Because the spirit always testifies
of Christ. That's what our Lord said. He
will testify of me. If it's the Spirit of God, He's
going to preach Christ. If it's the Spirit of God, He's
going to turn you to Christ. If it's the Spirit of God, He's
going to exalt the Lord Jesus Christ and what He has accomplished
by His death and resurrection for His bride, for His people. That's what He's going to do.
And that brings us back to Goliath now. chapter 17 everything about
him is fleshly and carnal and it appeals to the strength of
the flesh it appeals to to the confidence of the flesh but as
we know that's death it's that there's a way that seemeth right
unto a man but the end thereof are the ways of death It's the
way of death. We're told that his height was
six cubits and a span. Now, if we convert that to, I
think a cubit is 18 inches or 21 inches, something like that.
Anyway, it comes to about a little over 11 feet. Now, a giant person
in our day is someone who's about seven feet. They're big. A seven
foot person is really towering. So an 11 foot person is, It would be incredible to see
that. I mean, I think we'd all be struck a bit dumbfounded if
we saw somebody that was above higher than the ceiling. And
it would be pretty terrifying to see them there. His armor
was 5,000 shekels and was brass, which apparently was like the
leading armor of that time. enabled you to move swiftly in
it and carry it well. In 5,000 shekels, I think a shekel
is about a half an ounce, is what they say, at least a half
an ounce of weight. And so that being 5,000 shekels
of brass, his spear was 600 shekels of iron. So you're talking about
at least 175 pounds that he's carrying. Some say up to 350,
I guess if it's an ounce, but. Like that, he's carrying some
weight. And as an 11-foot man, it probably is very bearable.
It would be like you and I carrying maybe 60 pounds or something.
But it would be, as a grown man, it would be tough. But you get
used to it. And he could carry himself. And
he was meant to strike awe and fear into the hearts of those
that saw him. They were meant to say, do you
really want to go against this guy? Do you want to face this
guy out there on the battlefield? Not really. No, you don't. And
so when I was putting this together, I was thinking of John, the Apostle
John in Revelation, when he looked and he saw the whore of Babylon.
He described her as being, he was amazed at what he saw because
it's a picture of Antichrist, the whole system of Antichrist
having control of all the levers of society. They can just push
things and pull things and do things and make things happen
or prevent things from happening. They got it all under control. And John said in Revelation 17,
6, I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints. She
was persecuting and murdering, killing the saints of God. And
she was drunk with their blood and with the blood of the martyrs
of Jesus. And when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration. She was dazzling. She had all
manner of beautiful ornaments and things upon her that just
boggled the mind when he saw her, so that he wondered with
great admiration. And the angel said unto me, wherefore
didst thou marvel? Why did you look upon her and
marveled? Why was she so awed? Why did she strike you with such
awe in that way? He said, I'll tell you the mystery
of the woman and the beast that carrieth her. In other words,
her time is short. Her day of judgment is at hand. The Lord hath defeated her. He's
destroyed her. And that's what we see here with
David and Goliath. This man, though he's a mighty
man, and a man who's been fighting since he was a young man, and
a very skilled warrior, yet he's going to die that very day. He
will be defeated that very day. And so every day, Goliath would
go out there and challenge an Israelite to fight him one on
one. And he was doing it to shame
and to defy the armies of Israel. He would say in verse 8, choose
you a man for you and let him come down to me. If ye be able
to fight with me and to kill me, then will we be your servants,
which was a lie, because that's not what happens, they run, they
don't serve them. But if I prevail against him
and kill him, then shall ye be our servants and serve us. And we're told down in verse
11, when Saul and all Israel heard those words of the Philistine,
they were dismayed and greatly afraid. And so this Goliath is
Antichrist. He embodies evil. He embodies
that which is false, that which is wicked. And he boasts himself. And he speaks with pride and
arrogance. And he exalts himself in those
lies. And what we're seeing here is
that the natural man is no match for him. The natural man is no
match for this warrior. And what we're seeing here is
this is another example of the gospel that's declared to us
of Christ. How that he must save his people
and how that he does save his people from their sins. Our enemy
is too great for us. We've already yielded our dominion
to him in the garden when we sinned in Adam. When Adam sinned
against God, he gave up that dominion and yielded it to the
evil one who came in over the wall, not justly what he did. And so the enemy is too great
for us. We can't overthrow him. We're
not going to deliver ourselves from the devil. And yet that's
how the natural man in religion talks. That's how people talk
in our day and in every day. They think that they're able
just by making a few changes, a few decisions in their life
and doing better that they're going to overcome the evil one
and overcome that which is evil and wicked and make themselves
acceptable to God. That's the natural man. But here's
what the scriptures say, Hebrews 2, 14 and 15. 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. Just like the things that Goliath
was talking about. I'll defeat you and you're going
to be my servant. I'm going to put you into subjection
to me. And so what our Lord is showing
us is that our flesh is weak. We're not able to deliver ourselves. The law, a lot of people turn
to the law and say, well, I'm going to do my best to keep the
law, and by my law keeping, I'm going to deliver myself. I'll
make myself acceptable with God. But that's not why the law was
given. The law was given to show us
the exceeding sinfulness of sin, to show us the depths of our
own blackness of our own heart, to show us what vile, wretched
sinners we are. that we cannot keep the righteousness
of the law, and therefore, we must remain under the curse and
in bondage to it, except God be gracious. Except God be gracious
to us, and he deliver us, and he save us from that body of
sin. And in that body of sin, in religion,
we get accused by the devil. We get put down and beat down
all the time about how inadequate we are and insufficient we are
and unable to keep the law we are, and it's true. We are weak. We are foolish. We do sin and
fall and stumble all the time, all the time, and even in ways
that we don't even know. Even ways we don't know. And because
of it, seeing it, it keeps us in bondage and we're afraid.
We're afraid of death. And that's where Israel was. When they looked
at Goliath, they said, I ain't going down there. Man's going
to rip me apart. I'll be dead. As soon as I get
near him, I'll be dead very quickly. And so that's what we're seeing. That's the reality that they
saw, that Israel saw there. And that's why they wouldn't
face him. And so Saul here, he's a picture of the flesh. And he
cannot save himself or his people. He can't do it. And this is where
David is brought into the picture. This is where David comes in
now. We're given a brief history of David and his family. We're
told that his three eldest brothers served Saul in the army. They
followed him. Jesse had eight sons, David being
the youngest, the eighth. And while all this warring was
going on, we see David feeding his father's sheep. And it says
for David in verse 15, David went and returned from Saul to
feed his father's sheep at Bethlehem. And that's just a good reminder.
If you would find Jesus, you'll find him feeding his sheep, which
the Father hath given to him. That's where our Lord will meet
with his people, is in feeding the sheep, giving them the gospel,
feeding them the bread of heaven, his body and his blood. Now the
scriptures, they bring us into a picture here of what God our
Father did in sending Christ into the world to save his people,
to deliver us from the accuser, from the taunter, from the enemy
of our souls. That's what the picture is that
we're going to see here tonight. First, we're told in verse 16,
and the Philistine drew near morning and evening and presented
himself 40 days. 40 days. For 40 days, God the
Father allowed this enemy to taunt the people. Every day,
he came out and gave the same word, tempting them. accusing
them, calling them out, come on down, face me, face me, let's
have this one-on-one battle here, forty days, and forty days is
no accident, it reminds us that the Lord has used forty days
many times in the scriptures, it rained for forty days and
forty nights, but for forty days, every soldier there would examine
his heart, examine his thoughts, examine his mind, he'd be thinking,
I can't do this. I wish I could go down there
and deliver the people. I wish I could face him, but
I can't do it. I'm not going to be able to save myself. And
so they saw, for those 40 days, I'm insufficient for the task.
I can't do it. I can't deliver myself or my
people. And then we see the father sends
a deliverer, a savior, onto the battlefront, and he would deliver
the people from their enemy. That's what we see. Verse 17
here. Jesse, being a picture of the Father, said unto David
his son, Take now for thy brethren an ephah of this parched corn,
and these ten loaves, and run to the camp of thy brethren. You know, our Savior was in the
bosom of the Father for all eternity until that appointed time when
it was time for Him to come to lay aside His robe of glory and
take upon Him the weakness of this flesh. And He came to His
brethren to feed us and to save us and to provide for us all
that we needed in this wilderness of a life, in this battle that
we're in here. And so we're told in Galatians
4, 4 and 5, but when the fullness of the time was come, God sent
forth his son, made of a woman, made under the law to redeem
them that were under the law that we might receive the adoption
of sons. And so the father provides for
us as sons in sending his son with provisions that we need.
bread of heaven, for our life, for our sustenance, for our good
and our comfort, to teach us of Him. And Jesse said to David,
verse 18, And carry these ten cheeses unto the captain of their
thousand, and look how thy brethren fare and take their pledge. You know, Jesse had no real idea
of the particular details of what was going on, but our Father
in heaven does. He knows everything. He ordains
all things. He brings to pass His will and
His purpose. He is in perfect control. The
enemy is not in control of everything. He's not in control of anything.
He's doing the bidding and the will of the Father. according
to what the Father purposes and He wills. That's all He can do.
That's all He can do. He can't harm anyone unless the
Father gives Him leave to do it. Our God is the one who is
sovereign and in control of all things. And so the picture for
us here in the gospel is that we're here in a struggle on earth
and there's a battle raging all around us. But our Lord sends
His Spirit, the Spirit of His Son to us and we understand the
things of God by His Spirit, by the faith, the fruit of faith
which He gives us. That's how we look and understand
the scriptures. That's how we look at what's
going on in the world in the battle, right? We'd lose our
mind just looking at the things going on in the world. But we
have the peace and the comfort of knowing that our God is sovereign,
that he's in control of all things. And while we do get moved here
and there, we're settled in the salvation of our souls. And we
know we have an inheritance in Christ and that cannot be touched
or taken away No thief can break in and steal it. The rust doesn't
break it down. Moths don't chew it up. It never
diminishes. It never goes away. It's fixed
for us in Christ. In Christ. He's our inheritance,
and that's never going to change, no matter what happens to us
here in this world. And so our Lord sends his spirit
and his gospel, and he gives us faith to behold and understand
the things of God, and he sustains us with all that we need. This
parched corn and these 10 loaves, picturing all the blessings of
Christ given to us through his redemption. All the blessings
of God are yours in the Lord Jesus Christ, and he gives them
freely. He's gathered you here tonight
to hear this word. to comfort your hearts, to put
you in memory of what He's done for you, to glory and rejoice
in your God, and to give thanks and praise to His name, thanking
Him for what He's done. And He takes the pledge of His
poor people, and He takes back our prayers and concerns and
cries to Him, to the Father, while at the same time He brings
the pledge of His love and His comfort from our Father in Heaven
to our hearts in the new man which He's created anew in us. And He speaks to us in the new
man, and He comforts that new creation of His, settling us
in Christ. David went there as his father
instructed him, and he heard the boast of the Philistine Goliath.
Verse 26, And David spake to the men that stood by him, saying,
What shall be done to the man that killeth this Philistine,
and taketh away the reproach from Israel? For who is this
uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of
the living God? So David comes, and what does
he do? He rightly calls out, he rightly
describes the enemy. He's just an uncircumcised Philistine. This man's nothing. To the eyes
he may appear to be something, but before God, he's nothing. He's just a little worm. He's
just a little bug to be crushed and destroyed. And so David comes
speaking the truth, recognizing the enemy is no match for the
true and living God. And that's what happened when
Christ came, the Son. He exposed dead letter religion. He exposed false religion. He exposed those who appeared
and made themselves to be the church of God, made themselves
to be the controllers of the entrance into heaven and glory,
and he exposed it. And he showed us their nakedness. And he told us the truth. He declared the truth, even though
his enemies hated him for it. And Luke 18, verse 9 says that
he would tell parables unto certain which trusted in themselves that
they were righteous and despised others. That's the religion of
man. Don't come near me. I'm holier
than thou. And they speak about what they
do and how awful you are. And so they despise others rather
than being kind and gentle and gracious and declaring the truth. and keep declaring the truth.
As we saw, that's how we minister to our enemies, who smack us
in the face. We tell them the gospel again. That's where we
preach the gospel. We declare, no, no, no, the truth
is Christ. Christ is our salvation. He's
our righteousness. He's our salvation. And again,
he told them who their father was. He said in John 8, 43 through
45, why do you not understand my speech? Why don't you understand? Even because you cannot hear
my word. They heard him speak audibly
with the natural ear, but they could not hear what the spirit
saith unto the churches. Now the spirit exalts and magnifies
Christ in our hearts and shows us that he is our salvation.
And he blesses his people to hunger and thirst for the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we find all our satisfaction
in him. and his parched corn, and his
10 loaves of bread, he satisfies us. He feeds us. And he told
them, you're of your father the devil, and the lusts of your
father ye will do. They murdered him. They took
Christ and put him on the cross, nailed him to a cross. Now, of
course, he went willingly to save his people. But they, in
their minds, did wickedly. They did evil. They wanted to
put him to death. For as the devil is a murderer
from the beginning, and a bow not in the truth, because there
is no truth in him, when he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own,
for he is a liar, and the father of it. And because I tell you
the truth, ye believe me not. And so the Jews, with Christ,
they counted themselves the elder brothers. They despised Christ
for telling the truth. They despised his coming. They
hated how he came. They hated that his parents were
poor, that he was from Galilee, as far as they knew. They didn't
know he was born in Bethlehem. But they didn't want to hear
it. They didn't want to ask. They didn't want to understand. They hated
how he came. They hated that he was kind to
the poor, the weak, the sinner, the filthy, the vile, the polluted,
the diseased. They hated that. And that he
didn't come to them and praise them and pat them on the back
and say, boy, you guys are really doing some great work over here.
You guys really got the law down well. You're so good. You're
so wise. You're so smart. He didn't do that. He didn't
praise them. He didn't puff up their fat heads. He spoke the
truth. And he exposed their dead religion.
And so they defied him. They opposed him. And they took
him and nailed him to the tree. But look back at 1 Samuel 17,
28 and 29. This is, well, Eliab, this is the eldest
brother of David, heard when he spake unto the men, and Eliab's
anger was kindled against David. And he said, why camest thou
down hither? And with whom hast thou left
those few sheep in the wilderness? I know thy pride and the naughtiness
of thine heart, for thou art come down that thou mightest
see the battle. And David said, what have I now
done? Is there not a cause? And that's really what we're
coming to. This is the final point here
for tonight. There is indeed a cause for the
coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. Like this enemy, Goliath, who
the armies of Israel could not defeat, that they were terrified
of and afraid of, Because He's too great for us. We're too weak,
unable, insufficient for the work. We can't do it. And what the Lord is showing
us is that we need a Savior. We need a Savior. Israel here
needed a Savior. These men needed a Savior. They
needed someone to come and do that work and deliver them from
the hand of the enemy. And no man knows his need until
the Lord makes that need known to him. Sitting here in the quietness,
we might think we got it all together, but as soon as the
Lord brings manifold temptations and various trials, He begins
to shake us, and show us our weakness, and show us our great
need of Him, a greater need than we even thought, and He breaks
us down, and for a time we think God hates us, but we find out
He loves us. And He's given these trials and
these hardships and these difficulties and this warfare because of His
love for us from before the foundation of the world. And so He gave
us to Christ because He could give us to no one better. And
He committed us to the arms of Christ to be our Savior, our
salvation, to deliver us from death in grace. bearing the whole
weight upon His broad, glorious, strong shoulders. And He bears
us up in Himself to the salvation of our souls. Listen to 1 John
3.8, He that committeth sin is of the devil, for the devil sinneth
from the beginning. You and I can't change that.
That's just a fact. It's declaring that you that
sin, you're of the devil. We got problems. That's what
it's saying to us there. And the law was given to show
us our sin and the depths of them and that we're not going
to save ourselves. But listen to the second half
of the verse. For this purpose, the Son of God was manifested
that he might destroy the works of the devil. So the devil, he
came in and took that dominion. illegally, wickedly, unjustly,
but Christ came, and he bound the strong man, went into his
house, bound him up, and took all his treasure out. Through
his redemption, he took all those given to him by the Father from
before the foundation of the world, and brought us out free
of those shackles and the bondage of fear of death. Once David
slew Goliath, which we'll get to another time, but once he
slew Goliath, that was it. Israel was free. They were free. They were alive and free and
not in bondage or fear anymore. And so that's the cause of Christ's
coming. Natural man may not like it,
but Christ was sent of the Father to slay the enemy, to defeat
our foe, and to deliver us once and for all in eternal salvation
through the life of Christ. There is a cause, and that is
we need a Savior, and that's why he came. That's why he came.
Amen.