Well, I'm just delighted to be
here with you. I always, every time I've ever
preached here, I've enjoyed it very much. Love this church.
Love your pastor. As a matter of fact, I told him
this week, I talked to Len about it. We were discussing it, and
I said, if I could handpick the pastor for the place I preach,
if I would die, I'd pick Paul. I really would. So I'm just enjoying
being here very much. Glad to be with you. OK, turn
to First Samuel, Chapter 4. First Samuel, Chapter 4. Now,
I don't want to be guilty of over-introducing a message. I've
heard a lot of messages over-introduced, too. A lot of times when a preacher
gets up and says, I've really got a message for tonight, I
usually feel a little bit cynical. I wish I wasn't like that but
a lot of times when they say that sometimes it just hits me
that way. I guess that's my problem. But at any rate I wish I hadn't
said that. It depends on who's preaching
when they say that when it comes right down to it. Some folks
when they say it I think oh boy I can't wait. And at any rate I don't believe I
could preach a message that's more important than the one I'll
bring tonight. I've entitled this message, Faith
or Superstition? Faith or Superstition? Paul said in 2 Corinthians chapter
13, verse 5, he said, examine yourselves whether you be in
the faith. Examine yourself, don't examine
anybody else. Examine yourselves, whether you be in the faith.
And I pray that God will give us grace to do just that as we
consider this passage of scripture. Now, I have to admit that when
I first read this passage of scripture, it bothered me a little
bit. In the first two verses, we read
about the defeat of Israel. Israel's not supposed to be defeated,
are they? But they were defeated. Actually,
4,000 men were slain in this battle. Why were they defeated? Well, if you look in this 1 Samuel,
the trouble began over here in chapter 2 with Hophni and Phinehas,
these two boys that got killed in this battle when Paul was
reading. We read, beginning in verse 11 of 1 Samuel, chapter
2, And Elkanah went to Ramah, to his house, and the child did
minister unto the Lord before Eli the priest. Now, the sons
of Eli, talking about Hophni and Phinehas, the sons of Eli
were sons of Belial. They were wicked men. They knew
not the Lord. And the priest custom. Now, these
two priests, Eli and, I mean, Hophni and Phinehas, notice they
introduced a custom. It wasn't in the Word of God,
but they introduced a custom. Here's what they did. The priest's
custom with the people was that when any man offered a sacrifice,
the priest's servant came with the flesh, while the flesh was
in seething, with a flesh hook of three teeth in his hand, and
he struck it into the pan or kettle or cauldron or pot. All
that the flesh hook brought up, the priest took for himself. So they didn't shallow into all
the Israelites that came to him there. Now, in other words, he
was supposed to cook the sacrifice. And the priests introduced this
custom. They'd take a flesh of a big
three-pronged fork and stick it down in the pot and all the
meat that they could get out belonged to them. In other words,
they took something away from the sacrifice didn't they? Now
that's where the trouble begins and that's where the trouble
always begins. Taking something away from the
sacrifice. Verse 15, And before they burnt
the fat, the priest's servants came and said to the man, that
sacrifice, give flesh to roast for the priest, for he'll not
have sodden flesh of thee, but raw." He started changing the
sacrifice. And if any man said unto him,
let them not fail to burn the fat presently, then take as much
as thy soul desireth, then he would answer him, no, but thou
shalt give it to me now, and if not, I'll take it by force.
Now, they said, we're going to take whatever we want. Anytime
somebody changes the sacrifice when a preacher does that it's
always for personal gain. They were wanting to get some
more for themselves, weren't they? And we read in verse 17,
Wherefore, the sin of the young men was very great before the
Lord. For men, because of what these
two boys did, who were the priests, men abhorred the offering of
the Lord. Now that's where the trouble
begins for Israel. because men had began to abhor
the offering of the Lord, and now they are defeated by their
enemies. Now look in verse 3, 1 Samuel
chapter 4, and when the people were coming to the camp, the
elders of Israel said, Wherefore hath the Lord smitten us today
before the Philistines? Now note their attitude. They
didn't say, Why did the Philistines smite us? They said, Why did
the Lord smite us? before the listings you see God's
first cause behind everything. And if I know who he is I'm always
going to look to him as the first cause behind it. What's his purposes? The Lord brought this defeat
upon us. Let us fetch, now look what they say, let us fetch the
ark of the covenant of the Lord out of Shiloh among us that when
it cometh among us it may save us out of the hand of our enemies.
The people asked this question that I believe I'd ask the same
thing. How come we got beat? Let's go get the Ark. If we have
the Ark of the Covenant with us, we'll be able to defeat our
enemies. So verse 4, So the people went
to Shiloh, that they might bring from thence the Ark of the Covenant
of the Lord of Hosts, which dwelleth between the cherubims and the
two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the Ark of the
Covenant of God. Now remember when God in chapter
2 told Samuel that he was going to kill these boys. And that's
exactly what happened in this chapter. God said he was going
to kill him. And that's exactly what happened in this chapter.
They were the ones who had introduced this custom of the priesthood.
And verse 5, And when the ark of the covenant of the Lord came
into the camp, all Israel shouted with a great shout, so that the
earth rang again. Now there was some shouting going
on, and I can see why the ark was back. They thought they were
guaranteed to win now. Now that we've got the ark, we'll
beat the Philistines. Well, let's go on reading, verse
six. And when the Philistines heard the noise of the shout,
they said, what meaneth the noise of this great shout in the camp
of the Hebrews? And they understood that the
ark of the Lord was coming to the camp. And the Philistines
were afraid, they were scared to death. You know, I was reading
this, I was thinking, this is great, God's going to get them
now because the ark is there. For they said, God has come into
the camp. And they said, we're all under us. For there hath
not been such a thing heretofore. Woe unto us! Who should deliver
us out of the hands of these mighty gods?" These are the gods
that smoked the Egyptians with all the plagues in the wilderness.
You see, this was taking place only about a hundred years after
that took place, and they knew all about it. They'd heard about
all the plagues that had taken place. So they say, "'Be strong,
and quit yourselves like men, O ye Philistines, that ye be
not servants unto the Hebrews, as they have been to you. Quit
yourselves like men, and fight!' And the Philistines fought, and
Israel was smitten. Now why were they smitten? They
had the ark. They were smitten. And they fled,
every man into his tent, and there was a very great slaughter
for their fellow of Israel, thirty thousand foot men. Now in the first battle, only
four thousand, well that's a lot, four thousand, but now thirty
thousand people. or killed. They're in worse shape
than they were to begin with, even though they got the Ark.
And the Ark, verse 11, and the Ark of God was taken, and the
two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were slain. Now, Israel had the
Ark now, and the Philistines knew it, but the Israelites were
smitten anyway. As a matter of fact, they were
worse off than they were in the first battle. Now, what happened? I want you to think about this.
They had the Ark. And they had enthusiasm. Did
you read there in verse 5? They got the ark and there was
a shout going on. I reckon they thought they had a revival going
on of some kind. There was a shout going on. They
had enthusiasm. They had confidence, but they
were defeated anyway. My question is, what went wrong? Now, I read this passage over
and over again, trying to ask myself, what did go wrong? Why
were they defeated? But I believe the key to understanding
why they were defeated is in verse 3. And when the people
were come into the camp, the elders of Israel said, Wherefore
hath the Lord smitten us today before the Philistines? Let us
fetch the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of Shiloh unto
us, that when it cometh among us, it may save us out of the
hand of our enemies. And do you see that? They weren't
saying the Lord's going to save them. They were saying the Ark
of the Covenant was going to save them. Now that's where I
got the title of this message, Faith or Superstition. Their faith was not in God himself. It was in the Ark that represented
God. They took a good thing. a true
thing, an important thing, a scriptural thing, a thing that God had blessed
and made an idol out of it. Now that's what they were guilty
of doing. When it come, it may save us out of the hands of the
Philistines, they made a superstition out of it. And you know, I want
you to think about this, I can see how that happened. I try
to put myself in their place They had a high regard for the
Ark because the Ark was symbolic of God's presence. The Shekinah
glory of God dwelt among the Ark. Now can you imagine such
a supernatural sight? This very Shekinah glory of God. It was used, the Ark was used
to defeat the Midianites. When the priest carried the ark
over the Jordan River, what happened? The waters parted before the
ark, and the children of Israel marched through the Jordan River
as on dry land. And so I can see why they thought
pretty highly of that ark. It represented God's presence.
It was used in so many different ways. It was before the ark that
the walls of Jericho fell. Remember when they were marching
around Jericho and they had the ark with them and the priest
blew the horn and the walls fell. So I can understand why they
had a very high regard for that ark. But the problem was they
thought the mere presence of that material ark, as important
as it was, would ensure their victory and they found out that
they were dead wrong. They had faith in the ark and
not faith in Christ. Now, that could be the case with
me or you. That's why I've entitled this
message, Faith or Superstition. I can see how that could happen.
I can see them becoming taken up with that arc. Now, faith,
real faith, the faith of God's elect, the faith that saves the
soul, is a purely spiritual act. There's nothing material about
it. It's a purely spiritual act. We're called on to completely
trust somebody to save us that we've never even seen. We don't
even know what he looks like. We've never heard his voice audibly. We've never seen him physically. We don't know what his voice
sounds like. We've never physically felt his
embrace. We've never smelled the fragrance
of his body. We've not seen him physically,
yet we're called on to trust him and him alone as all we need
to save us. Turn to 1 Peter 1. I think most
of you are familiar with this passage of Scripture. 1 Peter 1. In verse 8, Peter
says, whom, speaking of Christ, whom having not seen, you love. In whom thou, though now you
see him not, yet believing, you rejoice with joy unspeakable
and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith, even the
salvation of your souls. Now, although I've never seen
the Lord Jesus Christ physically, I have seen him in his word.
I have. I've seen him in his word, and
I've known it's him. I've seen him spiritually. I've heard his
voice. Now, I haven't heard it audibly.
I've never heard him say, talk, and say something to me the way
a lot of people claim they've heard the voice. I've never heard
anything like that. But I've heard his voice in his
word. I've known it's the shepherd's voice. I've felt his embrace
in my darkest hours. I've smelled his fragrance among
his people. I have indeed tasted that he
is gracious. It's a purely spiritual thing. And I really believe, although
I've never seen him, I really believe his righteousness is
mine and it's all I needed to make me accepted before God.
If his righteousness is covering me, I don't need anything else.
I really believe that his shed blood is the only sin payment
I need. I need no other argument. I need
no other plea. It is enough that Jesus died
and that he died for me, as the songwriter said. I really believe
that. Now somebody says, prove it.
I can't. But I don't need to. I feel no
need to. It's a purely spiritual act. I believe that right now I'm
complete in Him. I believe that right now He's
seated at the right hand of the Father representing me as my
great high priest and intercessor. Right this very minute, there's
a man in glory representing my interest before God. Do you believe
that? I can't prove it. I've never
seen Him, but yet I rely my very soul's salvation upon Him. By simply resting in Him, I believe
I have all that I need. I say, with David of old, the
Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. Now, faith in Christ, like I
said, is a purely spiritual thing, but, but, but, but. Men always try and turn it into
something else, because when it comes right down to They don't
really believe trusting Christ alone is enough. So they try
to change it into something physical. Therefore, they find something
they can see to trust. Now, that ark was a good thing,
but they didn't use it for what it was supposed to be used, and
they made an idol out of it. And in so doing, they missed
Christ. And I can see how easily that
would have happened to them. And that's why I want to ask
myself the question, do I have real faith? Or do I have superstition? Like
these folks did. Do you have real faith? Do you
really trust the Son of God? Now isn't that what Paul tells
us to examine ourselves concerning? He said, examine yourselves whether
ye be in the faith. Know you not your own selves,
how the Christ Jesus is in you, except ye be reprobates in the
faith? Well, faith or superstition? Now, let's consider what took
place here. First, let's consider this ark.
Now, I can understand why they wanted the ark in their presence. The ark was, in fact, a thing
of great importance. And they were correct in having
a high regard for the Ark. The Ark was very important. God
said that's where his presence would be. Didn't he tell the
Israelites in Exodus 25? He said, I'll meet with you and
have communion with you there at the Ark with the mercies you
know. He said that is where a sinner
can meet the Holy God and not be consumed. At the Ark, it represents
the Gospel of Christ. Only the art was in the Holy
of Holies. Did you notice in reading that
passage of Scripture when Eli found out his two sons died,
he didn't fall over. When did he fall over? When he
found out the ark had been taken. Did you notice about Hophni's
wife? When she called her son Ichabod,
it was not when she found out that her husband had died or
when she found out that Eli had died. She proclaimed that when
the ark was taken. That's how important this ark
was. Look in chapter 5 and chapter 6, you can read in 1 Samuel here,
you'd read of two great judgments that took place because some
people misused the ark. First, when the Philistines stole
the ark, they took it and they brought it into their temple.
Remember there and they set up beside Dagan and they came in
the next day and Dagan had fallen over and then they set their
god back up. That's the way false religion
does. It falls over, they set him back up, help him back up,
and he falls over again and this time he's broken in half and
there's nothing left but the stump. The fishy part. He was some kind
of a fish god. And then God sent a disease on
the Philistines. Look in 1 Samuel chapter 5 verse
6. But the hand of the Lord was
heavy upon them of Ashdod, and he destroyed them, and smote
them with emeralds, even Ashdod unto the coast thereof. And when
the men of Ashdod saw that it was so, they said, The ark of
the God of Israel shall not abide with us, for his hand is sore
upon us, and upon Dagon our God. And they ended up sending it
to another part of the Philistines. And the same thing happened to
them, and there was a great disease. And they all got together and
said, This is because the ark's here. We've got to get rid of
it. Let's send it back to Israel. So, they sent the Ark of God
back to Israel after thousands of people had died. But look
what happened here in chapter 6. Look down in verse 19. It
was sent back to the coast of Israel. And look what happened
there. He smote the men of Beth-shemesh
because they had looked. Here's all they did. They looked
into the Ark of the Lord. Even he smote of the people 50,000
and three score and 10 men and the people lamented because the
Lord had smitten many of the people with a great slaughter.
Now what these people were guilty of doing, the only one who could
have anything to do with God was the high priest. Nobody could
touch him. And they had opened it and looked
inside, which is what they were guilty of doing was trying to
come into God's presence without a priest. Only the priest could
have it, and he couldn't even touch it. He had to bear it with
stakes. And so God killed, now you think of this, God killed
50,070 people because these people didn't understand the Ark. Now
that's how important this Ark was and it pictured who God is
and how God saves sinners. In other words, the Ark represents
the truth. The Ark represents true doctrine,
the doctrine of Christ, the doctrine of grace, the doctrine of the
gospel, truth. And we must have the truth. We will not be saved apart from
a knowledge of the truth. So when I talk about the truth,
I know from old self, I've got to hear the truth, Give me the
truth. If you don't give me anything
else, give me the truth about how God saves. I've got to hear
the truth of God's sovereign grace preached. I've got to. I've got to hear how men are
dead in sins. I've got to hear how God elected
a people. I've got to hear how Christ died for the elect and
accomplished their redemption. I've got to hear how God's grace
is irresistible and invincible. I've got to hear how God preserves
his people and keeps them to the end. And how they do persevere
the I've got to have the truth is necessary to me. I mean I
can't live off anything else if you. I remember when we first
started Grace Chapel we started in a real. Bad place I guess
there's a lot of bums and drunks and stuff there and I remember
one time we took this one fellow out and he. We're going to get
him something to eat he was drunk and I said well what do you want
to eat buddy and he said One from three. He said you give
me a hamburger I don't know why I want some free it's all I want
well we got through it. We took him over the park and
drive in the head well what I'm saying is I want the truth you
give me anything else I thought it was just like I felt that
the little way don't want to have anything to want the truth
and I'll tell you this you can't preach the gospel not preach
this. Not just not rejected but you must preach it. preach the
truth as it is in Jesus. There is no gospel apart from
this. This is the gospel. And that's
what the Ark is all about. It's about the truth. It's of
critical importance. It's of critical importance for
us to observe all the ordinances right. Baptism. Baptism by immersion. And somebody says, well, that's
not essential. It is true. If God revealed it, it's essential.
The Lord's table. We observe that the way we did. We observe all the ordinances
the way God tells us to do it in his word. All these things
are of critical importance. Meeting together like we're doing
right now. This is necessary. I've got to
meet together and hear the name of my Lord exalted and be with
his people. That's important to me. It's life. I can't live
without it. It's of critical importance. It's important to have the right
form of doctrine. It's important to have the right
mode of ordinances. It's important to observe the
Lord's table the way He taught. The right form, the right ceremony,
the right doctrine, it's all... I keep saying that, but I wanted
to seek in. There's no salvation apart from
it, but it's like this. It's like an egg with a shell. The right doctrine, the right
truth, light ordinances, the meeting together the right way,
all this is like the shell of an egg. You can't have an egg
without a shell. Can you? You can't have an egg
without a shell. But I also want to say this.
When's the last time you tried to eat egg shell? You really can't get any nourishment
from that, can you, by itself. If that's all there is, You can't
derive any nourishment from that. I've made many egg salad sandwiches
when I was a kid. It was kind of a thing with me.
I guess I, it was one thing I knew that I could. But I never could
get the shell off all the way. Somehow it would stick and I'd,
you know, it'd take me a half an hour to get it peeled and
I'd always leave some egg shell in there. It was awful. Ruined
the egg salad sandwich. You see what I'm getting at?
You can have the right form, you can have the right doctrine,
you can practice the right mode of baptism, observe the Lord's
table as it should be observed, you can have the right this and
the right that, and perish. Now you can't be saved without
it. But you can have your doctrine straight as a gun barrel and
be just as empty. That's what we're talking about.
They had a high view of the Ark, but they missed who the Ark represented. They were trying to eat eggshells,
and they left out the yolk, the meat of the egg. And that leads
me to the second thing I'd like to try to say. You can't live
off the shell. You cannot live off the shell. Now, it's true you can't have
an egg without the shell. You can't be saved without hearing
true doctrine. But these Israelites thought
they could be saved by the ark. And that mistake they made was
fatal, wasn't it? Over 30,000 people were killed. What did they do? They confused
enthusiasm for faith. They were so excited they had
the ark. I mean, there was a shout that could be heard from miles
away. They confused enthusiasm and somehow religious zeal for
faith. They confused orthodoxy for salvation. We have the ark. We had the truth. We had the right doctrine. We're
in the right church. We had the right form and mode
of baptism. We do things the way they should
be done. But the religion was nothing more than the shell.
It was nothing more than superstition. Now, our Lord warns us, broad
is the way that leads to destruction. And many there be that go in
there at. And he says it's broad because
there's so many forms. One fellow looks to his faith
to save him. You know, it's not faith that
saves, it's Christ. Now Christ saves through faith,
but it's not your faith that saves. What about when you don't
believe? Are there times, you know, I
can remember one time when I had been taking a medication that
made me go through a time of depression. And I was so depressed,
I didn't believe the Bible was the word of God. I didn't believe
in God. I didn't, I mean, I didn't believe
anything I was preaching. And yet I had to get up and preach
feeling that way. You'll try to do that sometime. That's hard. But you know, even then, when
I didn't have any faith, I knew even more strongly then than
I do now that Christ was my only hope. It wasn't my faith saving
me then, it was Christ. You know, a lot of folks look
to the strength of their faith to save them. That won't do it.
Another looks to his feelings. I must be saved because I feel
saved. What's it feel like? Feelings
come, feelings go, feelings are deceiving. My wife has accused
me of not having any feelings on several different occasions,
but I do. I just, I might not show them
like she does, but I got just as many feelings as anybody else.
And and they're they frustrate me so much because I just asked
me, you know, you call me up. It depends on what time. How's
things going Todd? Well, I'm a great man. It couldn't
be better. And then call me up two hours
later. Well, things are bad. You know, feelings. Feelings. Feelings don't save. Somebody
else looks to the church they go to and I'm thankful to be
in a church that's sound with the gospel. God's grace is preached. But I can be in the right church
and be none the better for it. It's not the church that saves,
it's Christ. Another looks to his evidences and his good works. Somebody says, well, I feel like
I'm a better person than I used to be. Well, if that's your ground
to salvation, you've missed Christ altogether. Some look to their
rituals. I was baptized. Or they'll look
to some experience they had way back then and think, well, I
had that experience. I felt I was a sinner, and I
went to the front of the church. I confessed Christ, and I joined
the church, and may be very sincere in that, but I'll tell you what,
I looked at every experience I've had, and I don't trust any
of them. I don't even know how real they were. I'm talking about
every one of them. I don't know what was going on
in my mind. My only hope is Christ. It's
not my evidences or experiences. Perhaps the most subtle superstition
is the fellow who believes he's saved. Because he has the right
doctrine. Now, the right doctrine is precious
as it is and as necessary as it is and how and even though
there's no salvation without it, the believing the right doctrine
will not save. You're saved by trusting a person. Let me show you a passage in
John chapter 11. This was helpful to me. John chapter 11. Verse 24, Martha said unto him,
John 11, 24, Martha speaking to the Lord, Martha said unto
him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at
the last day. Martha's doctrine was accurate,
wasn't it? And she says, I know this will take place. She had
her doctrine down straight, and yet the Lord rebukes her. Jesus
said unto her, I am the resurrection.