Good evening. Every time I hear that song as
it goes through, I hear the first verse and I'm like, I need to
pay attention to that. And then I hear the second verse
and I'm like, I want to quote that one when I get up there. And I keep doing
that. And the one that stuck with me, that Christ hath regarded. my helpless estate, and has shed
his own blood for my soul. If you would, open your Bibles
to 1 Samuel, the book of 1 Samuel 1. 1 Samuel 1. The title of my message tonight
is, Five Things We Must Do. After hearing last Sunday night's
message from our pastor, it was titled, Wait and Be of Good Courage,
I thought to myself, man, I need to be reminded of that every
day. And then I walked back towards
the bank to get a drink of water and I heard someone else say
to someone else, and I need to be reminded of that. And then
a few minutes later, I started to go to the nursery and I was
stopped by someone and they said, wasn't that good? Man, I need
to hear that over and over again. And all week it's been on my
mind, I need to be patient. I need to wait on the Lord. So
as I'm preparing for this message, I started looking through the
word at people that I could remember that had to wait on the Lord,
had to endure something. And that led itself into reading
a lot of things and a lot of stories, and that's basically
where my message came from. Now, the first thing I need to
do is address when I give this title, five things we must do. Someone might hear that or they
might see the title on Sermon Audio and think, wow, he's getting
her to tell me what I need to do to be saved. Well, that's
not what I'm going to do. This morning, Cody had a message
where the rich young ruler came up to the Lord and said, what
good things should I do that I might have eternal life? And
we heard the Lord tell him that it's not what you do. Salvation
is in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's completely in Him. It's
solely in Him. And we have no role to play.
But in salvation, the Lord Jesus Christ gives His children a new
nature and a new heart, the new man. And this is what makes us
want to do these five things I'm going to say. And it's actually
the opposite of five things that we need to do to be saved. It's
five things that we must do if we are saved. Now the reason
that I can use the word must here is because a child of God,
by His grace, we must do them. He will make us do them. Okay,
so what are the five things? The first is we must look to
the Lord Jesus Christ. And Isaiah it says, look unto
me and be ye saved, for I am God and there is none else. The second one, we must ask of
the Lord. Matthew it says, our Lord says,
all things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye
shall receive. The third thing is we must believe
in the Lord Jesus Christ. In Acts it says, believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved and thy house. Number
four, we must wait on the Lord Jesus Christ. Wait on the Lord
and he shall save thee. And finally, we must worship
the Lord Jesus Christ. In Mark it says, when he saw
Jesus afar off, he ran and worshiped him. So we're going to look at
these five things using three different stories in the Word.
So that's where we are in the first book of Samuel here. And
we're going to start in verse 1. And verse 1 gives us a lot
of names, but we need to take the name Elkanah. And Elkanah
is a man. In verse 2 it says, And he had
two wives. The name of the one was Hannah,
and the name of the other, Peninnah. And Peninnah had children, but
Hannah had no children. And this man, Elkanah, went up
out of this city yearly to worship and to sacrifice unto the Lord
of hosts in Shiloh. And the two sons of Eli, Hophni
and Phinehas, the priests of the Lord, were there. And when
the time was that Elkanah offered, he gave to Peninnah, his wife,
and to all her sons and all her daughters, portions, or he gave
them all a portion. But unto Hannah he gave a worthy
portion, or a double portion, for he loved Hannah. but the
Lord had shut up her womb. And her adversary, Hannah's adversary,
which is Peninnah, the other wife, for to make her fret provoked
her sore, because the Lord had shut up her womb. And as he did
so year by year, when she went up to the house of the Lord,
so she provoked her. Therefore Hannah wept and did
not eat. Then said Elkanah her husband
to her, why weepest thou, and why eatest thou not? And why
is thy heart grieved, and not I better to thee than ten sons?"
So we see Hannah's problem here. Hannah is barren and she wants
a child. Look at verse 9. What does Hannah
do? So Hannah rose up after they
had eaten and shallow, and after they had drunk. And now Eli the
priest sat upon a seat by a post of the temple of the Lord. In
verse 10, and she was in bitterness of soul and prayed unto the Lord
and wept sore. Hannah went to the Lord. She went to the temple. She knew
where she had to go with her problem. And then she asked of
Him. Look there in verse 11. And she
vowed a vow and said, O Lord of hosts, if thou wilt indeed
look on the affliction of thine handmaid, and remember me, and
not forget thine handmaid. But wilt give unto thine handmaid
a man child, that I will give him unto the Lord all the days
of his life, and there shall no razor come upon his head."
And it came to pass, as she continued praying before the Lord, that
Eli the priest marked her mouth. Now Hannah, she spake in her
heart, only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard. Therefore
Eli thought she had been drunken. And Eli said unto her, How long
wilt thou be drunken? Put away thy wine from thee.
And Hannah answered and said, No, my lord, I am a woman of
a sorrowful spirit. I have drunk neither wine nor
strong drink, but have poured out my soul unto the Lord. Count
not thine handmaid for a daughter of Bilal, for out of the abundance
of my complaint or my meditation and grief have I spoken hitherto. Hannah was so desperate that
she went to the temple to ask of the Lord and she prayed to
Him. She asked for His help in delivering a child to her. She
was so desperate that she was mouthing the words and she was
weeping. She was in a place, in a humble
place. She knew the Lord was the only place that could fulfill
her request. So she had looked to the Lord,
she'd asked of the Lord, and obviously based on what she's
doing, she believes he's able to do it. Look at verse 17. Then Eli answered and said, Go
in peace, and the God of Israel grant thee thy petition that
thou hast asked of him. And she said, Let thine handmaid
find grace in thy sight. So the woman went her way and
did eat, and her countenance was no more sad. Hannah had been dealing with
this problem for quite a while. Obviously, Peninnah had had a
lot of children, and Hannah had been around this whole time.
She'd been waiting, but she believed that it would be done. Once Eli
told her, when he says there in verse 17, Go in peace, and
the God of Israel grant thee thy petition that thou hast asked
of him. Look what it made her to do at the end of verse 18.
And her countenance was no more sad. She had no proof. She believed that her request
was going to be fulfilled. As well as, what would she do
next? Look at verse 19. And they rose
up, her family, in the morning early, and worshipped before
the Lord, and returned and came to their house to Ramah. And
Elkanah knew Hannah his wife, and the Lord remembered her.
Hannah believed this whole time. Her countenance was changed.
She went home. She was no more sad. She fasted
no longer. She did not have to worry about
the same thing. Now in verse 20, Wherefore it came to pass,
when the time was come, about after Hannah had conceived, that
she bare a son, and called his name Samuel, saying, Because
I have asked him of the Lord. These five things that we must
do, there is no particular order for them. I only listed them
in this order because that's the order that it was in this
story with Hannah. Because we can actually do these
things at the same time. They're interchangeable. We can
always ask of the Lord while we're looking to Him. We can
believe in the Lord while we're asking Him. We can wait on the
Lord, believing that He's going to answer us. We can worship
the Lord while we wait, and we definitely look to the Lord while
we worship Him. And if the Lord is gracious enough
to us, we can have moments where we can have all five of these
at once. And may the Lord give us many of those moments. Now
turn with me over to 2 Kings. 2 Kings chapter 5. 2 Kings chapter 5. And we'll start in verse 1 with this
second story. Now Naaman, captain of the host
of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master, and honorable,
because by him the Lord had given deliverance unto Syria. He was
also a mighty man in valor, But he was a leper. Naaman had many
accomplishments. It says here that he was the
captain of the host of the king of Syria. He was over all the
troops. He was over everyone. It says
that he was honorable. He was a great man. Now there's
a little thing in here that gives us a reason why. because by him,
by Naaman, the Lord had given deliverance unto Syria. Naaman
was looked upon as a great man. He was looked upon as honorable,
and he was given the role of captain of the host because God
had delivered his enemy to him. Naaman is a great picture of
us, and we'll see this as we go through. Naaman had great,
great qualities. And if I'm being honest to you,
it's much easier for me to give you a list of my accomplishments,
the things I think I'm good at, than it is for me to stand up
here and tell you what I'm not good at. Because I don't like
to dwell on those kind of things. And let me read this verse again,
okay? And follow along with what Naaman
says of himself, his description. Now Naaman, captain of the host
of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master and honorable. because by him the Lord had given
deliverance unto Syria. He was also a mighty man in valor,
but he was a leper." Naaman thought of himself as
a great man, as a captain, a man of valor, a mighty man, honorable. But do you want to know what
Naaman was? He was a leper. I think of myself as a lot of
things, but you know what I am? I'm a sinner. And that's my number
one trait. There's nothing else I can say
about myself, positive or negative, that isn't just mired in sin. All of it. Naaman thought of
himself with all of these characteristics, and he just happened to be a
leper. What he was, was a leper who the Lord happened to allow
him to have some of these characteristics for a time. We need to realize
that sin is our dominant trait. That's what we are and that's
what the Lord sees when he looks at all men. Okay, let's keep
going. And the Syrians had gone out by companies and had brought
away captive out of the land of Israel a little maid, and
she waited on Naaman's wife. And she said unto her mistress,
Would God my Lord were with the prophet that is in Samaria, for
he would recover him of his leprosy." She's talking about Elisha. Verse
4, And one went in and told his lord, saying, Thus and thus said
the maid that is of the land of Israel. Now we all know that
Naaman, with all of these abilities he has, this sway with the king,
he's got power, he's got influence and everything, he had tried
to find a cure for himself. You know he'd done what he could
to get rid of this leprosy. But do you know who the Lord
sent to him to help him? It was a woman, a little maid,
that had been kidnapped from her home and put her in the house
of Naaman. And she told his wife, and the
wife told him, and so now he has someone that might be able
to help him. So look at verse 5. And the king of Syria said,
Go to, go, and I will send a letter unto the king of Israel. And
Naaman departed and took with him ten talents of silver, six
thousand pieces of gold, and ten changes of raiment. And he
brought the letter to the king of Israel, saying, Now, when
this letter is come unto thee, behold, I have therewith sent
Naaman my servant to thee, that thou mayest recover him of his
leprosy. So Naaman went to his king, and
the king wrote a letter on his behalf. And he got all this money
and all these different things, and he went to see the king of
Israel. And the letter says, I have therewith sent Naaman
my servant to you, the king, that thou mayest recover him
from leprosy. Let's look at the response by
the king of Israel. And it came to pass, when the
king of Israel had read the letter, that he rent his clothes, and
said, Am I God, to kill and to make alive, that this man does
send unto me to recover a man of his leprosy? Wherefore consider,
I pray you, and see how he seeketh a quarrel against me." The king of Israel realized here
that the Syrians had dominion over them. The Lord had delivered
the Israelites to Syria through Naaman. So now the king of Syria
sends the king of Israel this thing saying, I want you to cure
my captain of his leprosy. Well, the king of Israel thinks,
is this serious? Like, is he just asking me to
do this knowing I can't and he's going to come here and kill me?
I mean, he doesn't know what to think. So he rinses his clothes
and is just totally lost for what to do. Also notice that
how Naaman approached the king, how he came. He was told by this
little maid, there's a prophet in Samaria. that can help you
with this leprosy." So what did Naaman do? He went to his king. He got himself a letter of recommendation
telling how good he'd done, how great he was. He got himself
some silver. He got himself some gold. He
got plenty of clothes to wear, multiple changes, who knows what
you might need. And then he came to the king. So now look in verse
8. And it was so when Elisha, the
man of God, had heard that the king of Israel had rent his clothes,
that he sent to the king, saying, Wherefore hast thou rent thy
clothes? Let him come now to me, and he
shall know that there is a prophet in Israel." So Elisha sent word
to the king, bailing the king out, saying, Send him to me.
That's who he should have come to anyway. So God is going to lead his children
to the right place. So now in verse 9, So Naaman
came with his horses and his chariot and stood at the door
of the house of Elisha. Let's look for a quick second
and compare the way Naaman came to the prophet of God and the
way that Hannah came. Hannah came empty-handed. Hannah
came by herself. Hannah came with a countenance
of crying, of pleading, begging the Lord to help. Hannah came
knowing that the Lord was the only person who could help. Naaman
came bearing gifts. Naaman came with all his baggage,
all the things that he had with him. Naaman came thinking he
deserved to be healed from his leprosy. Naaman came riding on
a horse with a host. Naaman was ready to do whatever
he needed to get this done. Naaman was ready to buy his way,
cure of leprosy. He was ready to bargain his way
to get rid of leprosy. He was ready to deserve his way
to get leprosy. And he was ready to, by force,
get cured of his leprosy. So now look at verse 10. And
Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and wash in Jordan
seven times. and thy flesh shall come again
to thee, and thou shalt be clean." Naaman was given an answer, but
Naaman came to the prophet as the great man, the captain, the
honorable, the mighty man, the man of valor. He didn't come
to Elisha as the leper. The Lord answered Naaman, Elisha
told Naaman the only thing he had to do to get rid of his leprosy.
But in telling him, you would think, okay, Naaman's number
one priority, if you could go to Naaman and say, well, if you
could have one thing, anything in the world, what would it be?
You know what his answer would have been? Get rid of leprosy. So he got an
answer to that one question, and you know what we found out?
He's just like us. His pride was more important
than his leprosy. Alright, look here at verse 11.
So Elisha didn't come to the door. He sent a servant out there
to tell him what's going on. So verse 11 said, But Naaman
was wroth. He was angry. And he went away
and said, Behold, I thought he will surely come out to me and
stand and call on the name of the Lord his God and strike his
hand over the place and recover the leper. Are not Abana and
Pharphar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters in
Israel? May I not wash in them and be clean?" So he turned and
went away in a rage. A couple things I want to point
out. In verse 11, and his description of what he thought would happen.
He had a journey. It was a good journey to Israel.
And in that journey, I'm sure he had walked himself through
of how this would happen. And he probably pictured this
thing of him probably didn't even have to get off his horse.
Probably had the biggest horse out there and he was higher than
everyone and this man was going to come out and honor him and
do some ceremony or say something and everybody was going to think
how great Naaman was in this. In verse 11, his description,
he says, I thought he was going to call on the name of the Lord
his God. Naaman was not asking his God
to do it. He needed Elisha's God to do
it. So, look at verse 13. Remember,
Naaman's done with it. He's leaving. He's offered him
a cure, but he doesn't want it. If he's got to lower himself,
he's got to be a base, he doesn't want it. Verse 13 says, And his
servants, Naaman's servants, came near and spake unto him,
and said, My father, if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing,
wouldst thou not have done it? How much rather, then, when he
saith to thee, Wash, and be clean. So this servant comes to Naaman
and has to tell him, think about this. If he'd given you some
grandiose thing to do, if he'd have said you need to go conquer
some country, Naaman would have gone for it. I've heard preachers
make the comment, if somebody said, if you brought a million
dollars to this church, you're going to be saved. People would
be trying everything they could to find a million dollars to
do it. But if you say you just come, it's free, nobody shows
up. Everyone wants to do it in their
own way. They want the credit. They want to be the center. So
look at verse 14. Then went Naaman down and dipped
himself seven times in Jordan, according to the saying of the
man of God, and his flesh came again like unto the flesh of
a little child, and he was clean." The little maid and the servant
were used to heal Naaman. Neither the king of Syria or
the king of Israel had any role in it. They couldn't help. They
didn't know what to do. Now, all that being said, look
what then happens in verse 15. Naaman is now clean, he's been
healed. And he returned to the man of
God, he came back to Elisha, he and all his company, and came
and he stood, notice he's not on a horse, he's standing, he
got off his horse, he stood before him and he said, Behold, now
I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel. Naaman was made whole and what
did he do? He worshipped God. Now, there
are many stories that I went through that actually show a
child of God doing the five things we must do better. But I have
a couple reasons for why I chose this Naaman story. Because if
we look at it, Naaman went about this the exact same way that
I go about it. Naaman didn't look to the Lord
to help him. I don't look to the Lord. I look
to myself. Naaman didn't ask the Lord for help. I don't ask
the Lord for help. Naaman didn't believe that the
Lord could do it. He just thought, well, maybe
there's a chance. I'll go try it out. And he was ready to walk
away from it. He didn't wait on anything. His servant had
to make him go back to do it. And he sure didn't worship until
the Lord had saved him. Until the Lord had shown him
who he was. I promise you that at some point tonight or tomorrow
in the very near future, I'm going to have an issue or a problem
come up. and I am not gonna do what I've
spent the last week studying and I'm telling you to do right
now. That's why I love this story of Naaman because it shows us
that the Lord is gonna make his children go the way they need
to go. The second reason that I chose
Naaman is despite our best effort to mess things up, Our Lord leads
His dear children along. Naaman went to a king when the
maid had already told him where he needed to go. And then he
went to another king and then refused the prophet until finally
a servant told him what to do. We must look to the Lord, but
He must give us the sight. We must ask the Lord, but He
must give us the questions and the answers. We must believe
in the Lord, but He must give us faith to believe. We must
wait on the Lord, but He must give us patience and wisdom to
do so. We must worship upon the Lord,
but He must give us a desire to do it and a zeal to do it. All of these things that we say
that we must do, we must do them because we want to do them and
God will make us do them. He will make all His children
do them. Let's turn over to Matthew. Matthew chapter 15. For our final
of the three stories. Matthew chapter 15. Look at verse 21. Then Jesus
went thence and departed into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon.
Now let me read you in Mark's account. Let me read the first
verse or two in that because there's a part of this that's
great. And from thence he arose, the
Lord arose, and went into the borders of Tyre and Sidon. And
he entered into a house and would have it that no man know it,
but he could not be hid. The Lord went into a house and
would have it that no man know it." Now the Lord obviously knew
this, okay? But He went into a house that
no man would know it, but what happened? A certain woman whose
young daughter had an unclean spirit heard of Him and came
and fell at His feet. So go back here and we'll look
where you all are in Matthew. This woman was looking for Him.
She had worshipped him and she knew him. Look in verse 22. And
behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coast and cried
unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O LORD, thou son of David. My daughter is grievously vexed
with the devil. This woman knew who he was. She was looking for the Lord. That's the only one that would
do. He made it as if he would be hidden, but she would not
have it. She had to find him. She asked nothing of herself.
She was asking something for her daughter. And she was praying
that the Lord would help her. She was asking. Now all five
of these things could be included in the word prayer. I thought
of trying to change one of them to pray. We must pray to our
Lord. But all five of them are included in prayer. We pray,
we look at the Lord when we pray. Our prayers are so often us asking
the Lord for what we need. When we believe, we pray to Him.
We give Him thanks. While we're waiting, we're always
praying. And while we worship Him, we
always pray to Him. So this woman was praying to Him, and she believed. She fell at His feet. Look at
verse 23. But He answered her, not a word. And his disciples
came and besought him, saying, Send her away, for she crieth
after us. The Lord was silent. He didn't
answer her. Now, he didn't ignore her. That's
a word that came across my mind when I read that, that he didn't
answer. He didn't ignore her. He just didn't answer her at
the moment. And then look at verse 24. But he answered and
said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of
Israel. That had always occurred to me
as the Lord in a way rebuking His disciples. That His disciples,
this woman came and fell at His feet and she said, O Lord, Thou
Son of David, have mercy on me. And they said, Send her away,
she crieth after us. I don't know if that means that
she was looking at them. She was saying, somebody please
help me. But I don't think the Lord here, at least not completely,
was talking to his disciples. I think this is a message to
her. She was there at his feet because
we know he talked to her in just a second. And he said out loud
to his disciples where she could hear, and he said, I'm not sent
but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. This woman who
the Lord had not answered yet, begging him for mercy, he says
that she is a lost sheep of the house of Israel. You know that
had to have given her so much comfort. She understands who
she is. She knows who he is. And he said
to her, she's a lost sheep. She's one of my sheep. So then
look at verse 25. Then came she and worshipped
him, saying, Lord, help me. His comment there, she came back
for more. She kept worshipping him. The
Lord didn't answer her on the first time, but that didn't change
her attitude. She continued to worship Him.
When we ask things of the Lord, when we approach Him, when we
pray to Him, it doesn't matter if He gives us a yes, He gives
us a no, anything in between, or He doesn't give us an answer.
That's the best possible thing that we could get when we ask.
Whatever it is, we keep worshiping Him. We don't know. We think
we know. We go back to Nahum in here,
I think I know what I should get. I think when I pray I know
what He's going to tell me, or what He should tell me, or what
I would tell myself. All that. It doesn't matter. What the Lord
tells us is what we need to hear. So let's keep going. Verse 26, like to Naaman, this would have
been too much. Did he just call me a dog? It makes me think of Caleb in
the Old Testament, whose name is translated dog or faithful
dog. He was a very important man.
And as we see here, this woman is okay with what he said. She
says in verse 27, Truth, Lord, Yet the dogs eat of the crumbs
which fall from the master's table." This woman agrees with
the Lord, and that's what we must do. Whatever his answer
is, we must agree with it. But not just that, she agrees,
and yet she asks again. She says, but the dogs get the
crumbs that fall. She's continuing to ask for the
blessing. Continue here in verse 28, Then Jesus answered and said
unto her, O woman, great is thy faith. Be it unto thee, even
as thou wilt." And her daughter was made whole from that very
hour. Our Lord answered her prayer. As I was going over this, thinking
about it this afternoon, it came to me that, can you imagine this
woman's trip home? I don't know how long this affliction
had happened to her daughter. Many would say that this is one
of, if not the worst thing you could ever go through. Your child
is grievously vexed with the devil. And she begged and prayed. She was called a dog. She wasn't
answered. But then the Lord told her, your
daughter, well, he told her, be it unto thee even as thou
wilt. He grants her request. And I
thought, while she's going home, I think she's doing all five
of these things. She's worshiping him. She's praying
to him. She's looking to him. She believes
him. She's going home. And, you know,
it hit me. She didn't walk home. She ran
home. She was going to get to see her daughter. And she wasn't
running home to see if her daughter was OK. She was running home
to see what the Lord had done for her daughter. Now, as I chose
these three stories as I was preparing this message, and I
was trying to finish the message, a conclusion just didn't come
to me. I could have always just repeated
the same thing over again, and I went back and looked at the
stories, and so often in preparing a message, I don't know why some
of the decisions happen the way they happen, except hopefully
the Lord put it in that order. But as I reread these three stories,
it came to me in reading each one that they all end in a certain
way. So in closing, I'm going to read
the last phrase or line from each of these three stories and
see how they make sense. Look at how well It summarizes
what the Lord Jesus Christ has done for his children. Alright,
listen to this. With Hannah it said, The Lord
remembered her. Then went he down and dipped
himself seven times in Jordan, according to the saying of the
man of God, and his flesh came again like unto the flesh of
a little child, and he was clean. And her daughter was made whole
from that very hour. This is a summary of what the
Lord Jesus Christ did at Calvary for us. The Lord remembered his
children. Then he went down and he took
the wrath of God upon himself, all of the sin, and he was buried
in it. But when he arose, he was perfect,
he was clean, and he ascended on high, and her daughter His
bride, the church, was made whole from that very hour. And because of what He's done
for us as children, we consistently want to wait on Him. We want
to look to Him. We want to believe on Him. We
want to worship Him. We want to do all those things,
and by the grace of God, we will.