Now we have this morning a very,
very sobering lesson with a serious warning for God's church. A very
difficult lesson. I have struggled mightily with
it this week, but it is necessary. It's a very necessary warning
for God's church. Right now, at this time in our
lives, the Lord is in our midst. As we meet here week by week,
the Lord is in our midst. In the past several weeks, I
can think of particularly, I've heard some of the best messages
that I've heard in my life. I mean, the Lord has blessed
us now. That's his doing. But there's
a warning. The Lord may leave this place
one day. He might do it. That may seem hard to believe
at the moment, but it happens in our text. You know, to the
people there in Shiloh, that may have seemed out of the question
to them at one point, but the Lord left that place and gives
us a warning for the church. So let's look at it here in 1
Samuel 4, verse 1. And the word of Samuel came to
all Israel. Now Israel went out against the
Philistines to battle and pitched beside Ebenezer and the Philistines
Now Samuel's message as the prophet went throughout all of Israel,
particularly his prophecy that we looked at in the past weeks
about what would happen to Eli's house. But even that and all
of his message went throughout all Israel. One thing we know
about Samuel, this man was faithful. He was a faithful prophet and
his message went throughout all Israel. And the Philistines bring
the battle to Israel. In verse 2, the Philistines put
themselves in array against Israel. And when they joined battle,
Israel was smitten before the Philistines. And they slew of
the army in the field about four thousand men. 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. When it cometh among us, it may save us out of the hand
of our enemies." Now, Israel suffers this horrible military
defeat. Four thousand men, I mean, think
of that, were killed in one battle. And the people wonder, why has
the Lord done this to us? Now, maybe they've forgotten
Samuel's message. Maybe they didn't think The Samuel's
message is prophecy of what would happen to Eli's house was possibly
connected to this battle. I don't know, but they wondered.
And you know, the world that we live in is filled with bad
things. I mean, bad things. My wife,
Janet, has not watched the news and I bet over two years. She has not watched the morning
news, the evening news. She just doesn't watch it. She
doesn't read the newspaper. She doesn't watch it. Too much.
Too much bad news. I wasn't feeling well yesterday
afternoon, propped up in front of the TV, where typically I
am on a Saturday when I do feel good, and the news and so on.
I wanted to watch it. She sat in there with me. I don't
know why I don't watch the news. It was filled with bad news. There wasn't one piece of good
news in that whole half hour. This world is filled with trials
for God's children. It's filled with wars, sicknesses,
heartaches, everywhere you look. You don't have to look hard to
find it. And I'll tell you the reason why. You don't have to
wonder why these things are in this world. It's because of sin. That's why. Now, the people of
Israel here, they wonder why this has happened. But you'll
notice they're still mighty good Calvinists, aren't they? They
know the Lord did this. The Philistines didn't do this.
The Lord did. The Lord smote us before the
Philistines. They know, despite everything else that they may
be wrong about, they say now the Lord's the first cause of
everything. Why has the Lord done this to us? Now, our text
doesn't say this, but I'll show you this in a few minutes. We'll
turn to this scripture. Israel had fallen into idolatry. That's exactly why the Lord had
done this to them. They had fallen from the true
worship of God into idolatry. And the problem, the root cause
of their falling into idolatry was in the pulpit. The reason
the people had turned to idols was because of the behavior of
Phineas and Hopni, the priests. They abhorred the sacrifice of
the Lord. You remember a few weeks ago we read it. They caused
the people to abhor the sacrifice of the Lord and they turned to
idols. The problem is always in the pulpit. When a group of
people leave the gospel, the problem is always with the spiritual
leaders. Invariably. And you know what
else is always the case? The people suffer for it. Always. So they came up with a solution.
The elders of Israel come up with a solution. They're going
to fetch the ark of the covenant. Now that sounds on the surface
like a good idea, but you notice what they say? It will save us
from our enemies. when it comes into the camp.
They had made an idol out of the Ark of the Covenant. You would think that's possible,
but that's what they did. They weren't worshipping some
graven image. They had made an idol out of
the Ark. The Ark is not God. There's no
help in that Ark. All that Ark is is a chest covered
with gold. The help, the power is in the
Lord of Hosts. who dwells between the cherubims.
It's the Lord is our Savior. And what they say is it will
save us from our enemies. They don't say the Lord will
save us from our enemies. It will save us from our enemies.
They made it an idol. You see how subtle that is? It's
so subtle. The Ark of the Covenant ought
to be respected. Absolutely it ought to be. But
the Ark is not God. The Ark is not the Savior. Christ
is the Savior, and the actions of the people here are a direct
reflection of the leadership. I have a quote, I printed it
out and framed it, hang it on the wall in my study, from Spurgeon. The limping of the leader is
the language of the people. And that's exactly why this is
going on. There's no record of them seeking
God's will in this matter. You know, they wonder, well,
why did the Lord do this to us? Well, they didn't go ask him,
did they? They didn't go to Samuel. Maybe, you know, they recognized
him as the prophet. Maybe Samuel might have some insight on this
matter. No, they just said, let's fetch the ark. It will save us. And I know why they didn't go
ask the spiritual leaders. They lost respect for him because
of the actions of Hophni and Phinehas. They shouldn't have
lost respect for Samuel, but the reason they lost respect
for him is because of the actions of Hophni and Phinehas. Now look
over in Joshua chapter 6. The problem with this whole plan
of theirs is this. You don't fetch the Ark of the
Covenant. The Ark of the Covenant stays
where God put it until God says to move it. You don't fetch the
Ark of the Covenant any more than you fetch Jesus to be your
Savior. You don't do that. Now you do
call on Him. You call on the Lord Jesus Christ. You beg Him. to save you. You
beg him to have mercy on you, but you wait on him to fetch
you. Oh, Mephibosheth down there, he didn't go fetch David, did
he? David sent and fetched him. And that's the way this thing
works. But now there was a time when
the ark was taken to battle. Look in Joshua chapter 6 and
verse 2. And the Lord said unto Joshua,
See, I have given unto thine hand Jericho, and the king thereof,
and the mighty men of valor. And ye shall compass the city,
all ye men of war, and go round about the city once. Thus shalt
thou do six days. And seven priests shall bear
before the ark seven trumpets of ram's horns. And the seventh
day ye shall compass the city seven times, and the priests
shall blow with the trumpets." See the seven priests shall bear
before the ark? God told them to take the ark
into that processional. Big difference when God says
you take the ark. and put it around the city, as
opposed to you fetching the ark. It's a big difference, isn't
it? Well, they fetched the ark anyway, and look back in our
text here in 1 Samuel 4, verse 4. So the people sent to Shiloh,
that they might bring from thence the ark of the covenant of the
Lord of hosts, which dwelt between the cherubims. And the two sons
of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the ark of the
covenant of 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, they bring the ark of the
covenant to them, and buddy, they had a big revival, didn't
they? I'm telling you, it was a sight. They were just as loud
as a bunch of Pentecostals. They were so loud, the earth
rang. I mean, they were having fun,
weren't they? Now, these people were sincere. They were sincerely
rejoicing. And the fact that the Ark was
there, they weren't rejoicing in Christ, were they? They were
rejoicing in it, that it has come into us. They were excited
about religion. They even used the name of Jehovah.
But religion, all religion, without Christ, is empty and vain. It's a canker. Their words of
it is a canker if it's without Christ. Now, all they had here
was a religious show. They just had a pep rally. When
I was in high school, I loved pep rallies. You know, we had
a big group. We'd run out and do these skits
and all this. I mean, we loved to get people fired up. And that's
exactly what this is. It wasn't worship. It was just
getting people revved up. True worship is in the heart. It's in the heart. It's in spirit
and in truth. It's not an allowed outward show.
It's in the heart. Well, verse 6, 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,
they probably sent a spy to kind of see what was going on, and
they understood that the ark of the Lord was coming to the
camp. And the Philistines were afraid, for they said, God is
coming to the camp. And they said, woe unto us, for
there hath not been such a thing heretofore. There has not been
such a thing in these past two days where we had this battle
two days ago. Woe unto us who shall deliver
us out of the hand of these mighty gods. These are the gods that
smote the Egyptians with all the plagues in the wilderness.
Now be strong, 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." Now it seems like the Philistines
give more respect to God than the Hebrews do, don't At least
they said it's God that's done these things. They didn't say
it or they are. They said God's done these things.
And they know this. If God be for me, who can be
against me? They know they've heard about
the Lord of hosts. They know if he's going to fight
for Israel, they know they're fighting a losing battle. But
they're determined. They had their own pep rally.
They're determined to fight anyway. Because they'd rather die fighting
as free men than live as a slave. And I have to say, I admire that.
I respect that. So, verse 10, buddy, they fought.
And the Philistines fought. And Israel was smitten. And they
fled every man into his tent. Not only did they flee the battle,
they ran all the way home, went under their bed and hid. They
fled to their tent. And there was a very great slaughter.
For there fell of Israel 30,000 footmen. And the ark of God was
taken. And the two sons of Eli, Hophni
and Phinehas, were slain. Now Israel thought the defeat
two days ago was bad. Four thousand men died. Now seven
and a half times more than that died. Thirty thousand men. And
Hophni and Phinehas, the priests, were killed in one day. Just
like the Lord told Samuel he was going to do. And worse than
that, the ark of God was taken. God told Eli, you're going to
see an enemy. in my house. The enemy took the ark of God,
took it away. And that was the worst possible
news that could come to a Jew. They lost more than a treasure
chest. They lost the presence of God
that went with that chest. And this is what happens when
the ark is in the hands of wicked men. It's the same thing that
happens today when the gospel is in the hands of a false prophet.
When the gospel is in the hands of a false prophet, God is never,
ever glorified. Not when the gospel is in the
hands of a false prophet. And sinners are never saved. Never. You cannot be saved from
hearing a lie, any more than God can be glorified through
the preaching of a lie. And there ran a man of Benjamin
out of the army and came to Shiloh the same day, with his clothes
ramped and the earth upon his head. And when he came, lo, Eli
sat upon a seat by the wayside watching, for his heart trembled
for the ark of God. And when the man came into the
city and told it, all the city cried out." Just like God said,
both the ears of everyone who heard what God had done tingled,
didn't they? Tingled in fear and horror. Now,
someday the Ark is going to come back to Israel, but this is so
serious. I read this and just, oh my goodness. The Ark's going to come back
to Israel someday. The Ark will never again come to Shiloh. When they fetched the Ark out
of Shiloh, it never returned to Shiloh again. And Shiloh dwindled
down to nothing. The Lord will never use that
city again. You think that can't happen to
us? You think that can't happen in Ashland, Kentucky? Look at
Psalm 78. Scripture gives us some warnings
here. This is the scripture I told you. Here's why the Lord did
this. David tells us. Psalm 78, verse 56. Yet they tempted and provoked
the Most High God and kept not his testimonies, but turned back
and dealt unfaithfully like their fathers. They were turned aside
like a deceitful bow. They provoked him to anger with
their high places and moved him to jealousy with their graven
images. They'd fallen into idolatry.
And when God heard this, and you could say this about a lot
of different times in Israel's history, couldn't you? But here's
the specific time David's talking about. When God heard this, he
was wroth and greatly abhorred Israel, so that he forsook the
tabernacle of Shiloh, the tent which he placed among men, and
delivered his strength into captivity, and his glory into the enemy's
hands. And he gave his people over also
unto the sword, and was wroth with his inheritance. The fire
consumed their young men, and their maidens were not given
to marriage. Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows
made no lamentation. That happened because they turned
away from the gospel and turned to idolatry. Look at Jeremiah
chapter 7. Here's a warning. Don't follow their example, God
says, or you'll be like Shiloh. Jeremiah 7 verse 11. Is this house which is called
by my name become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, even I
have seen it, saith the Lord. But go ye now unto my place,
which was in Shiloh, where I set my name at the first, and you
see what I did unto it for the wickedness of my people Israel."
Now remember, they didn't turn away from being Calvinists, did
they? They turned away from Christ, from the Lord. And he said, you
go see what I did to Shiloh. And you repent and don't follow
their example. Now, the Lord will never permanently
remove his presence from his people, from spiritual Israel.
Never. We have that promise from God's
word. But the Lord will take his presence away from certain
cities, from certain different local churches. Why? Because they quit preaching Christ. That's why. And like I said a
minute ago, the problem always begins in the pulpit. When the
gospel's not preached there anymore, God's not going to honor that
preaching anymore. He will not honor any preaching
except the preaching of his son. God will not honor false preaching
with his presence. He just won't do it. So 1 Samuel
4 again, verse 14, let's read on. And when Eli heard the noise
of the crying, he said, What meaneth the noise of this tumult?
And the man came in hastily and told Eli. Now, Eli was ninety
and eight years old, and his eyes were dim that he could not
see. And the man said unto Eli, I am he that came out of the
army, and I fled today out of the army. And he said, What is
there done, my son? And the messenger answered and
said, Israel has fled before the Philistines, and there being
also a great slaughter among the people. And thy two sons
also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead, and the ark of God is taken. And it came to pass, when he
made mention of the ark of God, that he fell from off the seat
backward by the side of the gate, and his neck break, and he died,
for he was an old man and heavy, and he had judged Israel forty
years." Now, you notice this man didn't run in from the battle
until Eli first, did he? A lot of the writers say, you
know, said there by Eli's eye being dim, this guy kind of snuck
around Eli because he didn't want to have to tell Eli this
news. He told everyone else first, but finally he had to come to
the Eli and tell him. And Eli's been sitting there
in fear. His heart trembled, not for his sons, not for the
army, for the ark of the Lord. He was very fearful. He knew
they should not have taken that ark to that battle. And he could
have prevented the whole thing. That's why he's sitting there
in fear. Now, when Eli heard about the slaughter of the army,
30,000 men died. He sat there still. He wasn't
too surprised. When he heard both of his boys
had been killed, he sat still. He wasn't too surprised. He wasn't
surprised at all about that. God told him he was going to
do that. But when Eli heard that the ark of God had been taken,
he fell over in horror, hit his broke his neck and died because
Eli knew what that meant. Israel had lost the presence
of the Lord. And historically, this is a bad
day in Israel. Not only was their army decimated,
the high priest, the most important man in Israel, died. And his successor died on the
same day. So look at verse 19. And his
daughter-in-law, Phineas' wife, was with child. near to be delivered. And when she heard the tidings
that the ark of God was taken, and that her father-in-law and
her husband were dead, she bowed herself and travailed, for her
pains came upon her. And about the time of her death,
the women that stood by her said unto her, Fear not, for thou
hast borne a son. But she answered not, neither
did she regard it. And she named the child Ichabod,
saying, The glory is departed from Israel, because the ark
of God was taken. and because of her father-in-law
and her husband. And she said, the glory is departed
from Israel, for the ark of God is taken. Now Eli's daughter-in-law
went into early labor and she died in childbirth at the news
that she heard. And she died brokenhearted. And
I know she was mourned for her husband and her father-in-law,
but her real sorrow, she says, is the glory is departed from
Israel, for the ark of God is taken. And you know, mothers
are usually happy when a healthy baby is born, especially a boy
child who's going to grow up to be the high priest. He's next
in line now to be the high priest. But that child brought no joy
to her heart. That child could not compare
with the despair of the glory of God being departed. She probably
wished the child had died too. Honestly, it's better off for
a child to die at birth than grow up in a place where God's
removed his presence. That's true. And she named the
child Ichabod. Now that's a horrible name to
hang on a child in Ichabod. But it's fitting, since Ichabod
means the glory is departed. And that's what happened the
day of his birth. The glory of God has left Israel for a while. And it's left Shiloh forever.
Now that's a solemn, solemn warning. And we must guard against departing
from Christ and suffering the same fate as Shiloh did. Now, if you look over in Revelations
chapter 2, let's take a few minutes and read a New Testament commentary
on this picture that we have in 1 Samuel 4. In Revelations
2, verse 1. Under the angel the church of
Ephesus write, These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars
in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden
candlesticks. Now the angel that he's writing
to here is the pastor of the church of Ephesus. And you see
this in the preceding chapter, the seven stars are the seven
pastors of those seven churches. And the seven golden candlesticks
are the seven churches that he's going to write to here. And Christ
is the one who upholds those pastors. And he's, where do you
find him? And you see this in the preceding
chapter. He's in the midst of those seven golden candlesticks.
He's in the midst of his people where the gospel's been preached.
But something has happened to cause him to write a letter to
each of these churches and each of these pastors. And the letter's
addressed to the pastor because the problem is there in the pulpit. And here's the message for his
Pastor in Ephesus, for the church in Ephesus in verse 2. He says,
I know thy works, and thy labor, and thy patience, and how thou
canst not bear them which are evil. And thou hast tried them
which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them
liars. And you have borne, and hast patience, and for my name's
sake hast labored, and hast not fainted. Now this church in Ephesus
began very, very well, didn't they? They began in Christ. founded
by the Apostle Paul. The Apostle John, before he wrote
this letter, he lived there in Ephesus. Timothy had been their
pastor for a while. So they began very well. And they haven't done anything
morally wicked, have they? We don't read about them living
licentiously or anything like that. What we read about them
is they have works of obedience. They have a labor of love. They
have the fruit of the Spirit. They labored tirelessly without
fainting in the name of Christ. They tried the spirits. They
listened to the preachers. They tried the spirits, whether
they are of God or not. And they had some discernment.
They could compare their message with scripture and tell whether
or not they were apostles or not. They could tell a false
gospel from the true gospel. They had lots of zeal. Something happened, didn't it?
Look at verse four. I have somewhat against thee,
because thou hast left thy first love." You've begun well, but
now you're receiving a rebuke from the Lord because you've
left your first love. You've left Christ. You've left
off preaching Christ. You love many good things, don't
have anything to say against the things that you love, but
you quit preaching Christ alone. Maybe they got caught up in these
good works. I don't know. Maybe they got caught up defending
the gospel. We'll see this in our lesson
next week. The gospel does not need to be defended. Just declared. You do not need to defend the
Lord of hosts. He's got this matter well in
hand. But maybe they got caught up doing that. I don't know.
Maybe they got caught up preaching against false preachers. And
those fellas, you ought to be warned about them. Preaching
against false preachers is not preaching Christ. They quit preaching
Christ alone. Very subtle, isn't it? Can't
say anything against the things that they were doing, could you?
So subtle. Kind of like bringing the ark
over to battle. Very subtle. And the church at
Ephesus has gotten distracted by something that probably was
true. It was something you wouldn't
say it's a bad thing. It's a good thing. But that good
thing took them off on a tangent, took them away from preaching
Christ alone. This is true. You can make a
boatload of true statements, never say a false statement and
still not preach Christ. You can make a lot of true statements
and still not preach the truth. It's the perfect example of that.
Sometime at your leisure, you read this, Numbers 23 and 24.
No question, Philem is a wicked man, a false prophet. He's in
it for his belly. Yet everything he says, you can't
find one thing he says not true. You wouldn't say one thing here,
one thing he said and say, no, wait a minute, that's not true.
But he's a false prophet. Maybe the primary example of
false prophet in scripture. And he never said something that
wasn't true. And that's what happened here. I'll show you
that in verse 6. Look at what he says. He says,
With this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolosians,
which I also hate. Now the Nicolosians were wicked
people. I mean morally, outwardly, just
wicked. And the Ephesians were right
to hate their open sin and open rebellion. But hating the sins
of others and pointing out the sins of others is not salvation. Brethren, the problem is right
here in my heart. That's the sin I need to be concerned
about is my heart. Yes, those people are lost, but
I'm just as lost as they are without Christ, who is all my
salvation. And you'll be just as lost as
they are without Christ. who is all your salvation. That's
why we must, we're compelled to preach Christ and him crucified. God help us if we preach anything
but Christ and him crucified. See, this is how subtle not preaching
Christ can be. And God will not honor that message
with his presence. And that's what he says in verse
five. He says, now you remember, therefore, from whence thou art
fallen, and repent, and do the first works, or else I will come
unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place,
except thou repent." The Lord says, now you look at how far
you've fallen. You've fallen from grace, so
you've fallen a long way. When you've fallen from grace,
you've fallen a long way. You've fallen from preaching
Christ to preaching something that Just junk. Anything. If you preach anything that's
not Christ in comparison to Christ, brethren, it's dumb. I mean,
that's so. So the Lord says, you repent.
Just like John told us Wednesday night, the Lord always gives
space to repent. He says, you repent. Or you'll
be like Shiloh. I will come and remove the candlestick. Well, the candlestick, he said
in the previous chapter, is the church. I will remove the local
church, the light from that city, and that city is going to be
left in darkness. God's greatest glory is his sovereign
mercy, and sovereign mercy is departed when Christ is not preached. God's glory will only be seen
in the place where Christ alone is preached. We see the glory
of God Where? In the face of the Lord Jesus
Christ. So his glory will only be seen
where Christ is preached. God's glory will not be seen
in a place where people are not faithful and where people's conduct
is contrary to God's character. And you know when that happens?
When Christ is not preached. God help us. This has been my
prayer. This has been on my heart every
moment of this week. God help us. from departing from
the preaching of Christ alone. If we do, if we do, one of these
days, those little ones over there, those who are left, one
day are going to say, Ichabod. Frightening. Frightening. God's
faithful. God is faithful. Alright.