For the help of the Lord, I direct your prayerful attention to the second book of Samuel, and chapter 23. The 23rd chapter of the second book of Samuel, and we'll read through a text, verse 5.

Although my house be not so with God, Yet He hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure. For this is all my salvation and all my desire, although He make it not to grow. 2 Samuel 23.5 the everlasting covenant that was made with David and what it meant to him.

I will read from the beginning down to our text. And we've just sung about the Lord being with his people even to the end and to old age. So our portion begins, now these be the last words of David.

David, the son of Jesse, said, and the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet psalmist of Israel, said, The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and his word was in my tongue. The God of Israel said, The rock of Israel spake to me, He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God. That he shall be as the light of the morning, and when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds, as the tender grass springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain. And then the words of our text.

These last words of David tell us very much about him and about his God. It sets forth the humble beginnings, David the son of Jesse, and then going from those humble beginnings, raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, And then the sweet psalmist of Israel, what makes the psalmist so sweet is the Lord Jesus Christ and of this covenant that he is speaking of here.

And then he goes straight to the Trinity. First the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Lord spoke by me. The inspired word of God through David and what was in his tongue. We've only got to think of the Psalms, like Psalm 22, Psalm 69, those Messianic Psalms where Christ is set forth and His sufferings, His death.

Then we have the Father, verse 3, the God of Israel saying, then we have the Son, the Rock of Israel spake to me, He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of the Lord, or fear of God. And then verse four, really setting forth the Lord Jesus Christ, what He shall be. He shall be as the light of the morning when the sun rises, even a morning without clouds. And so the leader to our text is speaking all of God, all the prophetic of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And then David comes to his own personal interest in these things. And I hope that is where we always come. However much we might know the precious truths of God in our head as doctrines concerning God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost, that we might know those things personally which are absolutely vital.

David is saying here that this covenant is all of his salvation and all of his desire. It means so much to him. So in a sense we're coming to David at the end of his life and David is saying to us, is what at this time means so much to me. This is what is valuable, this is what is indispensable, hear the words of my mouth. And so it is in what David is coming to hear, declaring his interest, and he views it that even though his family is not what he would have it to be, yet God has still blessed him. with this blessing, this covenant, this everlasting covenant.

So I want to look with the Lord's help this evening. Firstly, at David's house that was not so with God. And then secondly, the yet, yet an everlasting covenant that was made with him. And then lastly, what the covenant meant to David. But firstly, David's house, not so with God. First, there was David's own sin. We know of his fall. We know of his adultery, his murder. We know that our Nathan came, his sin was pardoned. was forgiven, we have Psalm 51, a beautiful, penitential psalm of sorrow, godly sorrow, for his sin.

But David, like you and I, in load called by grace, we are sinners to our dying day. And the house of our tabernacle, it is not so with God. The apostle Paul, he says that the good that I would, I do not. the evil that I would not, that I do, a wretched man that I am. It's an amazing thing to think of the prospect in heaven when the body also is raised, as the body is redeemed as well, that in heaven there is no conflict between the redeemed soul and the body, something we do not know here below. We have the conflict between the new man of grace, the old man of sin, and that is with us all the time. And to think of an existence without that conflict, with no sin.

But David is saying, my house, my tabernacle, my earthly tabernacle, is not so with God. It's a good thing. If we can rightly confess this before God, and realize that the blessings that God gives are in spite of our sins, and you might say even because of our sins, we need such blessing and such a covenant as what David had.

So when David says that his house be not so with God, he's thinking in the first place of himself personally, of his own sin, But then we think of his house, his family. God has said through Nathan that the sword should not depart from thy house. And so we see what happened with Amnon forcing his sister Tamar and then Absalom a couple of years later murdering Amnon or killing him because of what he'd done to his sister Thoma, and then later on we have Adonijah trying to usurp the throne from Solomon, and before that we have Absalom trying to take the throne away from David himself.

Truly with David's house he had trouble with his children, he had trouble even we might say with his nephews, with Joab, and with the sons of his sisters Erewhon. And many of the Lord's people would come in with David in that way. We think of Eli. Eli's sons were men of Belial. They were in the priesthood. But for what they were doing, then they bore great reproach upon the name of the Lord. And Eli was reproved that he did not reproved his sons, he did not put them out of the priesthood.

But we read later on with Samuel, that when Samuel was old and Israel came and asked for a king, they said, thy sons follow not me. Even Samuel, he had trouble as well in his house, his house was not so with God. You might even say with our Lord Jesus Christ, himself perfect and pure, but his half-siblings, if you like, me read neither, did they believe on him." Our Lord is very clear with the people of God that a man's enemies are they of his own household.

And David here, he is mindful of this, what his house is. And no doubt we are as well. Many of the people of God have things that sorrow them, that grieve them. Their children do not yet know the Lord. They don't know whether they'll ever know them, but always pray on and hope and ask of the Lord to meet with them and bless them.

But the wonderful thing is here, that David begins this verse, although my house be not so with God. yet hath he made with me. I may be an encouragement to you here. If you can come in, if I can come in with David here and say my house is not so with God, but put the although in the front, and put the yet afterward, it's a real encouragement. God does not bless perfect people and perfect families. He does not bless those that have no sense of the fruits and consequences of sin in them and around them and in their families and to be very often feeling to be a failure.

So we come in with David as he begins here, this background, this backdrop to what then the Lord had done for him and he says yet. Yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure.

So on to look at our second point on this covenant, an everlasting covenant with him. On to look first at the covenants. Really there are two covenants set forth in the Word of God. Firstly there is the Adamic, you might say covenant, which was the covenant of works. That covenant, that commandment that was given to Adam that he should not eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. So the agreement was, the covenant as it was, was that while they did not partake of the fruit they lived, if they did, then they dined. And Satan tempted our first parents, they took of the fruit, They died, and we, as under Adam as our federal head, we die also.

Under the covenant of works, under the Adamic covenant, we are all sentenced to death. Physical death, and then the second death, eternal death. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. By the deeds of the Lord shall no man living be justified. That way is shut up as a way of life, it is a way of death.

But then throughout the Word of God and throughout the Old Testament first, there is revealed another covenant, step by step, and that is the covenant of grace. And Paul testifies of this to those in Galatia when they were seeking to obtain salvation by works, namely circumcision. He says that if ye are under the law, ye are not under grace. It is either grace or it is works. When he writes to the Ephesians, he says, by grace ye are saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.

So the covenant that is being revealed through the Old Testament and culminating in the new, in our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, is a covenant of grace. That is man, sinful man, under sentence of death, is receiving benefits is receiving good from the hand of the Lord, not because of any works from him, nothing in what he has done, but all of grace. Peter says, if so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious. And in the Old Testament, the Old Testament saints, they were tasting that the Lord is gracious.

So firstly we find it in Genesis 3 verse 15, in the first promise of our Lord Jesus Christ, the first revelation of the covenant of grace, that the seed of a woman should bruise a serpent's head, the first promise that through the seed, through childbearing, then the promised Messiah should come, there should come one, that would bring salvation. God instigated that. He first introduced and set forth the man right in the garden, right at the fall, the idea, the teaching, that there was to come a deliverer, a salvation that was of grace, not of works. And if He saves a man, under the sentence of death, under your works, I am showing you another way, a way in which it shall be My Son, My provision, He will do the work, He will do the saving and He will be the deliverer,



He will be the rock of what David speaks of here in the early part of this chapter. covenant which is the Narek covenant, the covenant that God made with Noah. After the flood, then Noah offered the sacrifices and God smelled a sweet savour and he said that the imagination of the heart of man is over the evil continually, that he would not destroy the earth anymore with a flood. And he gave him the covenant, the sign of the bow set in the cloud. When a cloud comes over the earth, I do set my bow in the cloud. I will look upon it and I will remember my covenant. My covenant. It is the Lord remembering that He has promised Nebergone to destroy the earth with a flood. That was a covenant of grace.

So Nebergone is given the idea of grace. He's also, as joining with that, is pointed to where that grace flows from in the sacrifice, in the bloodshed, in the sweet savour that God smelt. There is the Lord Jesus Christ. There is the sign of that covenant.

Then we have a covenant with Abraham. The one with Abraham, you might say Genesis 17 would be good, where it starts where God reveals that covenant that He made with him. It was a covenant of circumcision, but it was a covenant that in thee and in thy seed shall all nations be blessed." It's shown very beautifully in Genesis 22 when Isaac was to be offered on the altar and the ram was placed in his place. And the Lord blessed him, that in thee and in thy seed shall all nations be blessed. And the Apostle Paul to the Galatians, he It says that what was said to Abraham was not to have seeds as of many, but thy seed as one, that is Christ. And so again, it was sending forth a covenant, an agreement, and it was all of grace. It was not of works.

You don't read, like with the case of Noah, that if man obeys or does this, this and this, then I will not destroy the earth with a flood. He just makes this agreement and puts that bow in the cloud. And the same with Abraham. He had obeyed the voice of the Lord, as what he had already done, was pointing to our Lord Jesus Christ and His obedience, even unto death.

And then we come to Mount Sinai, which is the Mosaic covenant, the law, the Ten Commandments. You might say, where is the covenant of grace then? Well, we see the golden calf being maimed. We see Moses bring the tables of the law written, the first writing of the law, first writing recorded in the word of God, with the finger of God on tables of stone. And as Moses is angry when he sees the golden calf and he casts the tables, they break in the bottom of the mount. then when God said that He would destroy the people, Moses makes intercession for them. Not for anything good in that, but purely a grace and a mercy. And the Lord in great mercy, He rewrites the law, and He gets it put in the arm, a type of Christ.

We see the law fulfilled, the broken law, our broken law, fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ. We see much grace in Mount Sinai. We see that which God provided there even under the broken law, what the law could not do, and that it was weak through the flesh. God sending his own Son, and in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh. That's how Paul writes it in Romans 8.

Then we have the covenant that we read of in 2 Samuel 7. That is the covenant that God made with David. We read in the first part of that chapter his covenant with him and how that he would appoint a place for His people Israel, and that He will establish His kingdom. His kingdom He shall build in house. For my name I establish the throne of His kingdom forever." And reiterates that promise.

When David then goes in from verse 18 to Samuel 7 verse 18, he goes in before the Lord He says, Who am I, O Lord God? What is my house that thou hast brought me hither to? He says, And this was yet a small thing in thy sight, O Lord God, but thou hast spoken also of thy servant's house for a great while to come.

And then he says, And is this the matter of man, O Lord God? I don't believe he is just saying this It's the manner of man to foretell things in time to come. What he is saying is, have you set before me the manner of the man Christ Jesus? In Solomon is a type of the Lord Jesus Christ. His kingdom was being described here, not just Solomon's.

And so when David is speaking here that he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure, in one sense he's going back to that portion that we've read, to that covenant that God made with him, with his son, with his seed.

But then we have one more covenant that is set forth and set forth very clearly, the new covenant, in Jeremiah 31. It's also reiterated in the Hebrews. But in Jeremiah 31 and verse 31, then we read there of this new covenant. Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the tribe of Judah, not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which my covenant they break, although I was an husband unto them, saith the Lord.

But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord. I'll put my law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts, and will be their God, and they shall be my people, and they shall not teach no more, every one man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord, for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more."

He's pointing, pointing to the New Testament in Christ's blood. When we think of the Old Testament and New Testament, New Testament is another word for covenant. And really the whole Bible is covenantal. It shows forth God's covenant in the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Old Testament, it is in times, it is in shadows. The New Testament, is clearly set forth and remembered in the ordinance of the Lord's Supper. This is the New Testament in my blood. It's a covenant that is sealed with the blood of Christ.

But I want to think of this in this way, which David says, it may be an everlasting covenant. Yes, Through Nathan the covenant was conveyed to David. But for David and all of God's children, that covenant has been made before the world began between the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, the three that are set forth in the early part of this chapter.

God's people are chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world. Our Lord says of the Father, Thine they were and Thou gavest their name. They were put in the Lamb's Book of Life. They were chosen, foreknown, appointed for salvation. They are the people of God by a covenant made between the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost and the people that are beneficiaries of him being party to it, the same as the covenant between Jonathan and David, that David promised Jonathan that he would not destroy his seed, and afterwards when Jonathan was dead, when Saul was dead, then David sought out Mephibosheth, And Mephibosheth was blessed, not through anything in himself, he was laying about his feet, but he was brought to the king's table and blessed because of the covenant, because of the agreement between David and Jonathan. And this is what David would have had an eye to.

This is what we should have our eye unto, a covenant that is made before the world in Christ Jesus that we are the beneficiaries of. David is able to say that he hath made with me an everlasting covenant. And in one sense, we know that that covenant is made with us as the beneficiaries when what we read in Jeremiah comes to pass.

Our calling is what makes known our election. And the calling described in Jeremiah is that the covenant provides a teaching. And if one is to be taught, the first thing that they must be given is life. I give unto them, who? Them in the covenant, eternal life, this everlasting covenant. They shall never perish, neither shall any man plucked them out of my hands. And given that life, they have ears, they have eyes, they are alive, they are then taught of God, they shall all be taught of God.

And there is the seal and sign of that covenant, line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little. All of the people of God, born again in the Spirit and then taught by God. It's a great mercy to trace this, to realize that every blessing of calling flows out from that covenant. And this is why David goes on here. He says, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, and he doesn't stop there. He says, ordered in all things, and sure, there's not any doubt about what actually shall follow with that covenant.

So it provides for the choice in the first place. It provides for the Lord Jesus Christ to come and suffer, bleed and die for that guilty soul. It provides for life from the dead in the Lord Jesus Christ. It provides for a robe of righteousness that shall be wrought out for them in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then when that soul is called. Parents, native place and time, all appointed were by Him. And all of that teaching, the keeping, the means of keeping, the means of teaching, in the preaching of the word, in the word itself, in the gift of faith, all of that is provided in this covenant.

A mediator is provided in the Lord Jesus Christ ascended up into heaven. And heaven itself, I go to prepare a place for you. And so when David says, it is a covenant ordered in all things and sure, God is bringing about, it's got no weak link. It's got no weak link, it's not got man's weak link in it. The Lord will chasten his people, correct his people, lovingly draw them on, be a shepherd to them, a real shepherd. and all of this flows forth from the Covenant.

May we be able to trace, trace Covenant blessings up to that fountain, up to the Covenant, up to why it is so, why it is that we are receiving these things. So this is what David was able to view. I hope it is that we here are able to view the same, that we are able to trace Christ's blessings that don't come from fallen nature. They don't come from the broken Lord. They come from a gracious God.

And remember David here has two things that have been balanced here. On one side he feels what he is and what his house is. On the other side he's seeing a gracious God that has not dealt with us as our iniquities have deserved. The Lord is gracious along suffering. May we always know that. How many times we stand amazed when we look for wrath the Lord has sent mercy, when we look for the Lord's anger the Lord has shown kindness. He has not dealt with us as our sins have deserved. We prove his grace, his loving kindness, his long-suffering toward us and we trace up the reason because he will not break his own covenant. He will not go back. On that which he has done for his people, we read Paul saying to the Philippians, he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. Because it is in the covenant to perform it and to do that work.

But then I want to look lastly at what the covenant meant to David. Now, quite a few places in this text, there are words that are very, very significant, aren't there? The very beginning word, although my house, and then yet, what a blessed yet that is, and those things that make it personal, my house, made with me, personal things, but then we have what David says here, this is all, not some, but all, mine, okay, his personal, my salvation, and all, not just part, but all my desire, for though he make it not to grow, all his salvation, He's not looking anywhere else. This is His whole resting place, is in this covenant, is in what the Lord has promised and brought about. If ever His poor soul is saved, if ever He gets to heaven, if ever He's delivered from His enemies, it is all His salvation depends upon that covenant. What else could it depend upon? What else could we say? Well, is there something to be added to it? Should we add works? Should we add some human effort to it? Should we add something of men? No, he says, oh, my salvation.

Have we really looked upon that which the Lord had done in government before the world was? and ratified with us in calling and teaching as being all of our salvation. But then he says it is all his desire as well. No doubt with dear David he, like all of those Old Testament saints, like in Hebrews 11, they died not having received the promises but saw them afar off and embraced them The promises of Christ coming. He said about David when he blessed the Lord, is this the manner of man? Is this Christ? That they looked as to what was being signified, as to what was being set forth. And it was their desire that Christ should come. But it should be our desire to see Him, to know Him, to enter more and more into what God has provided for us. If it is said that these things are what the angels desire to look into, and they're not even partakers of it, they're not sinners saved by grace, may we desire to look into these things ourselves, to find them to be most precious to us. may be our desire as well, to be with the people of God, numbered with them now, may I be, and to all, eternity.

When these truths are made known to us by the Spirit, it affects desires, takes away the desires of the world, replaces them with a desire for a heavenly country. You read of that again in in Hebrews, they declaring that there are strangers and pilgrims in the earth. They that declare such things say plainly that they seek a country, they seek a country that is unheavenly. But David adds another thing, although he make it not to cry, In the beginning of this text he reviews of what his house was and that in spite of that the Lord blessed him. But it seems as he comes to the close of what he says concerning the covenant and the salvation and all his desire, that he views it that it doesn't grow as he wanted it to. Now many of the Lord's dear people and desire that we had more faith, more love, more hope, more union, more clear views of the Lord. We are exhorted that we might grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, but often our feelings lack growth. We seem to grow more and more sinful, violent at our own esteem. and view more and more the beauties and goodness in the Lord, but viewing ourselves as an unclean thing, or not worthy of these things.

And really again, this is an encouragement the other way around. The other way around. Despise not the day of small things. Don't be discouraged. if that covenant is being made known to you. And yet you still see sin so rising up, you see things that are not quite right, you wish were different, though that I had not of myself.

But David says here at the end, the beginning was, although my house be not so with God, the end of the verse, although he make it not to grow, He still has made that covenant. He still has ordered it in all things. What a, what a hedging about the beginning and the end of this verse. You might say discouraging, except for the allow and the yet.

May we be able to see in this such real encouragement and help and strength in what David says in his last words. These be the last words of David. Although my house be not so with God, yet yet hath he made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure. For this is all my salvation and all my desire, although he make it not to grow. Amen.