Well, this morning I would like
for us to see in the scripture David as a picture of the two
Adams. First, we'll see David as the
first Adam who sinned and brought sin and death on every man. Then we'll see him as a picture
of the second Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ who recovered That's
the title of the lesson this morning, David Recovered All.
We'll see him as a picture of Christ who delivers all of his
people from all their sin, from Satan and from death. So beginning
in verse 1, 1 Samuel 30, And it came to pass, when David and
his men were come to Ziklag on the third day, that the Amalekites
had invaded the south, and Ziklag, and smitten Ziklag, and burned
it with fire, and had taken the women captives that were therein,
They slew not any, either great or small, but carried them away
and went on their way. So David and his men came to
the city, and behold, it was burned with fire, and their wives
and their sons and their daughters were taken captives. Now David
and his men returned home to Ziklag, and they find their city
destroyed. It's burned to the ground, their
wives and their children are gone. They probably assumed that
their families were either dead or very soon would be killed.
And you think how suddenly our world changes because of sin.
David was so happy. The Lord had delivered him from
bringing reproach on the name of the Lord. He delivered him
from fighting with the Philistines against Israel. And he's coming
home in such a good mood. He's been delivered from this
trial. He's going to see his wives. And suddenly everything's
different. Janet often says everything's
okay until it's not. Oh, David was so happy, and suddenly
he sees all their wives and children are gone. The city's burned with
fire. Can you picture the scene that they saw as they come over
the hill, around the corner, and there's Ziklag. Their homes
are ashes. There's probably smoke in the
air. All the form of civilization's gone. There's no food for them
to eat. There's nothing profitable or
useful left in that city. All the life is gone. The women
and children are gone, even the livestock is all gone. And they
can't stay there because there's nothing there that can support
human life. Now, why'd that happen? That happened as a direct result
of David's disobedience. If David had never left Judah,
this would not have happened. If David had not gone out to
war with the Philistines against Israel, This wouldn't have happened. He'd have been there to defend
his family. This death and all this destruction and loss is
a direct result of Adam's faithless or David's faithless disobedience. And can you imagine the horror
these men felt? I mean, I just can't hardly imagine
it. Well, that doesn't even compare to the horror we should feel
because of the results of our sins. You know, this scene that
David and his men saw is a picture of the misery that sin has left
you and me. Everywhere we look inside ourselves, all we see
is spiritual destruction, just deadness and ashes. There's nothing
profitable or useful at all to be found in us. Now, in our story,
The women and children were not killed. They were taken as slaves
because they're much more profitable as slaves than if they had just
killed them. And that leaves some hope for rescue for these
women and children, doesn't it? I'm sure they held some hope.
Somebody's going to come rescue them. But they knew this. Those
women and kids are not strong enough to set themselves free
from their captors. Someone else is going to have
to come save them because they cannot do it themselves. We're not just taking captive.
We are spiritually dead. We're just being put to death.
And there's no escaping because we're dead. You know, the dead
man is not only unable to escape, he's unwilling because he's dead.
There's no emotion. There's no ability. There's no
feeling. He's dead. Look at Romans chapter three. It's really impossible. For us
to describe this picture of what sin has left us in, bleak enough. The scripture gives us the description
here, Romans chapter 3, verse 10. As it is written, there's
none righteous, no not one. They're all dead. There's none
that understandeth. There's none that seeketh after
God, because every man's dead. They're all gone out of the way.
They are together become unprofitable. Not only are we unprofitable
just individually, put us all together, what do you got? Nothing. All of us even put together are
unprofitable. There's none that do us good.
No, not one. Their throat's an open sepulcher.
With their tongues they use deceit. The poison of asthma is under
their lips. Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their
feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and misery are in
their ways. And the way of peace have they
not known. There's no fear of God before
their eyes. Why? We're dead. This is every man,
woman, child born in this world. We're dead. Now, why'd this happen
to us? We know why Ziklag was burned
with fire. Their wives and children were taken captive. Why'd this
spiritual deadness come upon us? Well, how is it that we became
lost in sin? Because of Adam's sin. Look over
a page of Southern Romans, chapter 5. It's because of Adam's sin. In Romans 5, verse 12. Wherefore,
as by one man, Adam, sin entered into the world, and death by
sin. So death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. And if you look in your center
reference there, it says, in whom all sinned. When Adam sinned,
we sin in him. Every one of his descendants
were in him. What he did, we did. That's original sin. Because
of one man's sin, all the rest of us became dead. We were sold
under sin, we became enslaved to the law, and we're born with
nothing. We're born unable to keep that
law, God's law, because we're born with the sin nature that's
contrary to God and contrary to God's law. And because of
that sin nature, look back a page now at Romans chapter 3 again.
Because of that sin nature, this is true of us. Verse 23. For all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God. We've sinned and come short of
the glory of God because this is the nature that we receive
from Adam. And I promise you this. We will
never see any mercy from God until we see all of our righteousness
burned to the ground and left in ashes, just like David saw
Ziklag. We'll never see any mercy from
God until we see that we're left without any hope, without any
possessions, without any ability in ourselves. We'll never see
mercy from God until we're brought to that point. Now up to this
point, when David dwelt there in the land of the Philistines,
everything he received, he received from Achish, didn't he? Everything
David had there in the land of the Philistines, he received
something that was produced by the arm of the flesh. And everything
that's ever produced by the arm of the flesh is going to end
up in dust and ashes. That's the way it will always
end up. The only lasting thing is the Lord Jesus Christ and
everything that's in him. So they see their city burned
with fire. And I look back at our text in verse four. And David
and the people that were with him lifted up their voice and
wept until they had no more power to weep. I looked at that this
week and tried to think, tried to imagine how heartbroken these
men must have been. The families that they love.
I mean, how do you love your family? They love their families
this way. They're gone. They're just gone. I mean, losing one loved one's
heart, nothing. Imagine losing your whole family
all at once. Just at one fell swoop. That'd be tough to bear,
wouldn't it? And they cried till they had
no more tears. They couldn't cry any more. Now, that's a picture of true
mourning over sin. And that's the way we will mourn
over our sin if we ever see our sin for what it really is. Now,
I'm not talking about mourning over the results of our sin.
Mourning over the results of our sin is just being sorry I
got caught. Just being sorry that God's sending me to hell.
I'm talking about mourning over sin. And over rebellion against
God. Mourning because of what I am. Just crying so I can't cry anymore
because of what I am. I'm a sinner. And I beg God that
He would make us mourn over our sin like that this morning. Because
I promise you. There's a blessing for a sinner
who mourns like this. We're going to see this in this
chapter. There's a blessing for a sinner that mourns like this.
Our Lord said, blessed are they that mourn. They should be comforted. These men are going to receive
a blessing. So let's read on here. Verse 5, David and David's
two wives were taken captives. Ohenoam, the Jezreelitess, and
Abigail, the wife of Nabal, the Carmelite. And David was greatly
distressed, for the people spake of stoning Because the soul of
all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his
daughters. But David encouraged himself in the Lord his God. Now every man in David's army
lost his wife and his children. All of them had their home burnt
to the ground. And they're ready to stone David because they know
they're in this mess because of David's disobedience. They
knew that if David had never left Judah, this would not be
happening to them. None of this would have happened
if they just would have stayed where God told them to go. They
knew that and they were ready to stone him over it. And David
did what all of us should do every day. But especially in
this day of trial, he encouraged himself in the Lord. And that
word encouraged means to make strong. The only place we can
find any encouragement, any strength, any comfort is in the Lord our
God. Now get a hold of this. This
is a blessing. After everything David had done wrong in the last
year and a half, David has not done one thing right. After all that, Jehovah is still
his God. The Lord is still his God. David
said, Lord, if thou shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who
shall stand? But there is forgiveness with
thee. Now, this is such a comfort.
The Lord Jesus Christ is the Savior of sinners. Sinful men
and women can encourage ourselves in the Lord our God because He's
the Savior of sinners. Eric, we're not saved because
we did anything right. I mean, anything. Not one thing. It's
because of the mercy and grace of God, because the Lord Jesus
Christ, our substitute, our representative, did everything right. That's
where our salvation is found. We can comfort ourselves in the
Lord our God because of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, every man
lost his wife and his children. David included. Scripture made
a point of saying David lost his wife. And that's a picture
of the fall of Adam. When Adam sinned, every man,
woman, boy and girl ever born into this world They died. They spiritually died. They became
sinners because Adam's sin was imputed to their account, to
everyone he represented. And everyone fell. Everyone became
lost. Everyone died. Including the
bride of Christ. Including God's elect. Now this
is the bride of Christ. Those whom he has loved from
all of eternity. They fell into sin and death
and condemnation to the law. And those elect cannot help themselves
because they're dead. They can't help themselves. They're
dead. They have no ability to please God. They don't have a
desire to seek God because they're dead. And if they're going to
be saved, then we must do what David does. First of all, we
must seek the Lord. We must beg him for mercy. We
must beg him for forgiveness for Christ's sake. Because if
we're going to be saved, the Lord Jesus Christ, the son of
David, is going to have to come where we are. and redeem us from
all of our sins and recover us themselves. That's what David
has to do here. Look at verse 7. David said to
Abiathar the priest, Himalek's son, I pray that you bring me
hither the ephod. And Abiathar brought hither the
ephod to David. Now David told Abiathar, he's
the high priest, bring the ephod. And you'll remember from our
study of the tabernacle, the ephod was And it had those two
stones in it, the Urim and the Thummim, and they used those
to inquire of the Lord. They would ask the Lord, should
I do this or should I do this? And whichever stone they draw
out, that would give them the answer. So what's David doing
here? He's praying. He's seeking the
Lord. And it occurred to me, if David
had prayed and inquired of the Lord long before that, He would
be in this mess, I bet. You reckon he'd be in this mess
if he just would have been inquiring of the Lord for the last year
and a half? You can't overemphasize the importance of prayer. To
be in prayer, communication with our Heavenly Father. We should
be in prayer, asking Him for forgiveness, asking Him for wisdom,
asking Him for leadership. Our Lord said you have not because
you have not. We ought to be in constant prayer with him.
How can a believer go through a day without prayer? It's so
important. And David finally sought the
Lord, and he got an answer. In verse 8, David inquired of
the Lord, saying, Shall I pursue after this truth? Shall I overtake
them? And he answered, Pursue. For
thou shalt surely overtake them, and without fail recover all. David asked the Lord, Shall I
pursue after this enemy? The answer was yes, pursue. And David said, well, will I
overtake them? And the answer is yes, you'll overtake them.
You'll overtake them and without fail, you will recover all. You're going to recover everything
that's lost. You're going to cover all your wives and your
children. You're going to recover all the
possessions. There's no possibility of failure. You will recover
all. Now, David is a picture of the
second Adam. He's a picture of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Adam fell. He plunged the whole human race
into condemnation. And the son asked the father,
shall I pursue him? Shall I go after him and recover
them? And the father says, yes, you go. You shall without fail
recover all. In Isaiah 42, the Lord says,
behold my servant, whom I uphold, mine elect, and whom my soul
delighteth, he shall not fail. nor be discouraged. He'll recover
all. The scripture knows nothing of
this Jesus, little J, who came to earth to try to save as many
people as he could, as many people as would accept him. That Jesus
is a complete and utter failure. He has no power to save. If David
could only go recover the people who could help themselves, David
would be wasting his time. I mean, if they could leave where
they were and come join up with David, they wouldn't need David
in the first place, would they? The problem with Armenian theology
is that they do not understand what happened in the garden.
They do not understand that all men are spiritually dead. And that means that all men are
incapable of accepting Christ. They're incapable of coming to
Christ until God gives them life and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
The scriptures declare the Lord Jesus Christ who came to this
earth and he redeemed all of his people from all of their
sins and none of them will ever be lost. He will without fail
recover all that the Father gave to him in that eternal covenant
of grace. That's the Christ of Scripture.
Now, David, the Lord tells him, pursues. Look what happens in
verse 9. David went, he and 600 men that were with him, and came
to the brook Besor, where those that were left behind stayed.
But David pursued, he and 400 men, for 200 abode behind, which
were so famed they could not go over the brook Besor. We'll
come back to those men next week. In verse 11, they found an Egyptian
in the field. and brought him to David, and
gave him bread, and he did eat, and they made him drink water,
and they gave him a piece of a cake of figs, and two clusters
of raisins. And when he had eaten, his spirit
came again to him, for he had eaten no bread, nor drunk any
water three days and three nights. And David said unto him, To whom
belongest thou, and whence art thou? And he said, I am a young
man of Egypt, servant to an Amalekite, and my master left me, because
three days ago I fell sick." We made an invasion upon the
south of the Cherethites, and upon the coast which belongeth
to Judah, and upon the south of Caleb, and we burned Zechariah
with fire. And David said unto him, Canst
thou bring me down to this company? And he said, Swear unto me by
God, that thou wilt neither kill me nor deliver me into the hands
of my master, and I will bring thee down to this company." Now,
who is this young Egyptian? Well, you know he's a picture
of a sinner, isn't he? That's true, he's a picture of
a sinner. But more than that, he's a Gentile sinner. He's a
Gentile sinner. David is on his way to deliver
a bunch of Jews who've been taken captive. And on his way, what
does he do? He rescues a Gentile sinner. Christ is the Savior of Jew and
Gentile life. Sinners from all over the whole
entire world. God told Abraham, now the Messiah
is going to come from your loins and in thy seed. Shall all nations
of earth be blessed. Not just the Jews, but all nations.
And this Egyptian is a picture of you and me. We're Gentiles. He's a picture of you and me.
So we should pay attention to this here. And I give you three
pictures of us in this Egyptian. First, he's an Egyptian. He is
an Egyptian. And Egypt is a picture of sin.
It's all throughout scripture. Sin is not what we do. Sin is
who we are. This man doesn't just live for
a while in Egypt. He is an Egyptian. That's his
nationality. That's who he is. We don't just
commit some sins every once in a while, do some good things
and some bad things. All we are is sin. He's an Egyptian, just
like we're sinners. Secondly, he's a slave. He's
a slave to a heathen. And that's what we are. We're
slaves to sin. Our pastor says often, you belong
to somebody. You belong to someone. David
knew he belonged to someone. He said, to whom belongest thou?
You belong to someone. You either belong to sin and
you're in the condemnation of the law, or you belong to the
Lord Jesus Christ, one or the other. And I'm telling you, the
law is a cruel master. When you cannot please the law,
when you cannot obey the law, just like this young man, he
couldn't please his master anymore, so his master's left him for
dead. When you can't obey the law, the law doesn't just leave
you for dead. H.P. Law kills you, doesn't it? Kills
you. The wages of sin is death. So he's a slave to the heathen.
He's an Egyptian. He's a slave to the heathen.
And thirdly, this man is guilty. He didn't say, they left me and
they went. and burned your home and took
your wife and your children. We did. I'm guilty. He can't
deny his guilt, can he? And he confessed it to David.
Now, he took part in this raid against David's home, against
David's family. Isn't that what we are? We're
guilty of Adam's sin. We took part in that rebellion.
We said, I'll be like God. I'm not going to have anybody
rule over me, but me. We're guilty. Now what did David
do with this sick slave? He had mercy on him. He said,
don't send me back to that cruel master. And David said, oh, I
won't. Every member of this war party who went against David's
home and David's family, every one of them that asked for mercy,
received mercy from David. Every one of them. It was just
one, but every one of them that asked for mercy received mercy
from David. Is there anyone here this morning
that needs mercy? Do you need mercy from God? Have
you asked for it? Have you asked for it? Well, David had mercy on him
and he gave him bread and water. You know what that is. That's
a picture of Christ, the bread of life and the water of life.
And after that, his spirit came to him again. Well, that's the
new birth. When did God give you life? When did you receive
spiritual life? When God, through the preaching
of the gospel, gave you to eat Christ the bread of life and
gave you to drink Christ the water of life. But they didn't
just give him bread and water. They gave him eggs and raisins.
His mouth was filled with good things. That's the gospel. Our
mouth is filled with good things. How is it that you're blessed
today? How is it your mouth is filled with good things? to the
gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now this man, David had mercy
on him, but he's useless. I mean, he's just completely
useless. I don't think David needs this fellow, the sick slave,
to track that huge group, this war party. I mean, I reckon they're
pretty easy to track. I mean, you know, I see the Lone
Ranger, he tracks the horse through rocks. I mean, David could track
these people. He doesn't need this man, but
he uses him, doesn't he? He uses him to go to the camp
of the enemy. Now what's that? Well, it's all
God's people, but particularly it's God's preachers. We are
completely and utterly useless in ourselves. Just a clay pot. But we have the priceless message,
this treasure of the gospel of salvation in our Lord Jesus Christ. Just useless in ourselves. There's
nothing worse than a puffed up preacher. We're useless. But
God in his mercy and grace uses men, just useless men, to bless
his people, preach the gospel of his son. Now verse 16, And
when they brought him down, behold, they were spread abroad upon
all the earth, eating and drinking and dancing. They were just celebrating
because of all the great spoil they had taken out of the land
of the Philistines and out of the land of Judah. And David
smoked then, from the twilight even into the evening of the
next day. And there escaped not a man then, save four hundred
young men which rode upon camels and fled. And David recovered
all, all that the Amalekites had carried away. And David rescued
his two wives, and there was nothing lacking to them, neither
small nor great, neither sons nor daughters, neither spoiled
nor anything, that they had taken to them. David recovered all."
David won a great victory through a very great slaughter. And he
recovered everything that the Amalekites took away. Everything. He recovered his wives and children
and families. Everything. Big things and small
things. There wasn't a button missing
off of a shirt. David recovered all. And that's a picture of our Lord
Jesus Christ. He won a great victory through
a great slaughter, didn't he? Oh, he was slaughtered. But in
that slaughter, he won a great victory. He led captivity captive,
and the Lord Jesus Christ recovered all, everything. Now, I could
preach for the next two days on this, but let me give you
seven things that he recovered. First, Christ recovered all of
his people. He recovered his bride. Not one of them is missing. Behold, I am the children which
God hath given me. He said in his high priestly
prayer, Father, those that thou gave me, I have kept, and none
of them is lost. He recovered all of his bride. Second, he recovered lost righteousness. Now, we had a righteousness in
Adam, but we lost it in Adam, didn't we? The righteousness
is restored in Christ. But it's not just the righteousness
that Adam restored to us. It's much better than that. The
righteousness of Christ is given to us. We are made the righteousness
of God in Him. He restored righteousness. Third,
Christ recovered His people from the curse of the law. How did
He do that? In that great slaughter by being
made a curse for us. He recovered us from that curse.
He recovered his people from condemnation. There is therefore
now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus. He recovered
us from condemnation. Fifth, Christ recovered lost
life for his people. In Adam, we died, and he recovered
life for his people. But just like that righteousness,
this is better. He didn't just restore unto us
the life of Adam, which he didn't mean to lose in two He gave us
eternal life. He says, I give unto them eternal
life and they shall never perish. He recovered that life for his
people. Sixth, he recovered, lost fellowship with the Father.
Adam had fellowship with God. He walked with God in the cool
of the day. And he lost that fellowship,
didn't he? He thrust out of the garden. No more to walk with
God in the cool of the day. But in Christ, we have that fellowship
restored. How is it you're told to come
to your Heavenly Father? Boldly. Come to His throne boldly, crying,
Abba, Father. He's restored that fellowship
with the Father. And seventh, our Lord Jesus Christ
recovered the lost presence of God. Adam no longer had the presence
of God like he did in the garden. He had it like you and I do now,
but not like he did in the garden. Christ restored that presence
with God. Believers, Scripture says, have the presence of the
Spirit of God dwelling in you right now. You have the earnest
of the Spirit, the earnest of that purchased possession. And
one day, we're going to have it eternally. No longer through
a glass darkling, but face to face. Because Christ recovered
it. We're like those ashes of Ziklag.
We're born in this world with nothing. Born dead. But in Christ,
we lack nothing. Nothing lacking. He is made unto
us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. The people of
God lack nothing because Christ, without fail, recovered all. Recovered all. Isn't that a blessing?
I hope you can take it home with you this afternoon too on that
one.