If you will, turn back in your
Bibles to 1 Samuel 16. 1 Samuel 16. You can follow me in your pastor's
commentary if you will. If you desire, we'll be putting
up our points on the board, but you can do that as well. For
those of you who are consistently in our Sunday school class, you
will appreciate this forthcoming series. because the pattern of
exhortation is the same. And that has to do with understanding
how to utilize the Old Testament as a teaching tool to comprehend
God's eternal purposes in Christ. And that's what we're going to
talk about today as an introduction as we begin a series on the life
of King David. I'm almost reluctant to want
to put the series that way other than the fact that I know that
I will have sufficient time to explain what I mean by the life
of King David. Those of you who are experiencing
the study with our elder in Sunday school are enjoying seeing the
glory of God in Christ unfolding in the narrative of the Joseph
account, the Genesis account. Many of the things that are said
in that account will be also said today because they overlap
because the true subject of Scripture is one person and that's Jesus
Christ. So you will have things echoed
today that you will have heard this morning. I want to say in
the opening introduction and this is in your bulletin as your
pastor's commentary on a Christocentric hermeneutic I want to highlight
that as an introduction into the three points for us as we
deal with David. It's critical for us to realize
that the cohering factor, the thing that coheres the scripture
is the person and work of Jesus Christ. You cannot hear that
too many times. The cohering factor that brings
unity and clarity and harmony and understanding to the scriptures
is the person and work of Jesus Christ. Just as Christ is the
one who upholds all things by his own power, according to Colossians
117, all things are held together by him. So the scriptures are
held together by the person and work of Christ. Where we are
not taught to look for Jesus, In the scriptures, the Old Testament
will gradually fragment, separate, dissimilate, like the consistency
of something that's put together, its constituent parts will begin
to separate, and it will lose its shape and form. And this
is where a lot of people are deficient, and they're benefiting
from this God who never changes. When the scripture says, God
is the same yesterday, today and forevermore. The same is
said about Jesus in Hebrews 13. Those who do not understand this
cohering factor cannot really benefit from Old Testament teaching
in terms of what God's purpose in that book is. This is the
reason why a lot of Christians don't read the Old Testament.
Because the Old Testament requires you understanding a Christocentric
principle when it comes to studying the Word of God. That this book
is about Jesus Christ. And where that is not understood,
you do not get the benefit of the spirit of prophecy. I'm going
to lay out some rules today to help you understand why we are
driven and committed as a teaching ministry here at Grace to preach
Christ from every book of the Bible, every chapter of every
book, every verse of every book, and every word of every verse,
because he told us to do so. I'm going to share some rules
with you that are in your outline. They're not in our PowerPoint,
they're in your outline. Under this subject of the crystal centric
hermeneutic Our master told us in the gospel of luke chapter
24 verse 25 As he admonished the two boys on the road from
jerusalem to emmaus ought not christ To have suffered these
things And to enter into his glory having admonished them
and then he opened the scriptures and from moses throughout all
the prophets and the Psalms he declared, he expounded, he interpreted
those things concerning himself. Now ladies and gentlemen, most
theologians and most scholars would admit that this is the
fundamental rule of hermeneutic, but very few people practice
it. Very few people practice intentionally
looking for Jesus everywhere in the Bible. Now, there are
a number of reasons why that's the case. I'll touch on some.
But if your master, for whom you say he has died for you,
has told you that the Bible is about him, would it not be your
responsibility when you go to the Bible to look for your master?
As the Greeks said in John chapter 12, Sirs, We would see Jesus
because they had heard about him and they were looking for
him And that's the attitude you must have when you come to your
Bible. Otherwise, you will lose the benefit of the scriptures
John's gospel chapter 5 verse 39 is a rule of hermeneutic.
Is it not you are searching the scriptures? That's assumed that
you're doing it now in the 21st century. That's not true. I But
you are searching the Scriptures, talking to the rulers, the Jews.
And in them you think you have eternal life. That is to say,
you think you're saved just because you know the Genesis account.
Or because you know the beginning chapters of Matthew. But they
are they which testify of me. And unless a man or woman understands
that the Bible is about the revelation of the glory of God in the person
of Christ, you won't understand God's promise in Psalm 25 14
which says the secret of the Lord is with them that fear him
and he will show them his what covenant and that's the other
term you must acquire when it comes to understanding how to
interpret the Bible this is a covenant book This is a covenant book
and it's for covenant people. A sister asked me the question
on Friday, a very keen question. She was reading a portion of
scripture where it caused her to struggle with God wanting
to take a person's name out of the book of life, blocked him
out of the book of life. And she understands that salvation
is altogether of God, that a man who is chosen and called and
quickened can never lose his salvation. Her salvation or their
salvation. Why then is this terminology
used of having your name blotted out of the book of life? Well,
I told her you cannot understand that language unless you understand
citizenship. That you presume yourself to
be part of a kingdom, a citizenry whose name is on the ledger in
City Hall having been born there or are a part of that kingdom.
You cannot understand Genesis chapter 1 how God rhythmically
uses language in Genesis 1 where he talks about the creation of
the heavens and the earth in six days and on the seventh day
he rested from all his works which he had made. You cannot
understand that unless you understand something about the covenant.
The persons to whom the authors in the Old and the New Testament
are writing are to believers who are part of the covenant
and understand the framework of the covenant. There are some
premise or some a priori assumptions that you must know about the
Bible in order for them to make sense. Are you guys hearing what
I'm saying? So one has to ask the question, Lord, to whom are
you talking? And why are you saying what you're
saying to them? And in what context are you saying
it? In order for us to begin to acquire an understanding.
So I'm gonna share just some of the fundamentals in that outline
under a Christocentric hermeneutic. The first reason for which people
really don't pursue this approach of biblical interpretation is
because of a fear of abuse. of the typological freedom some
have exercised. The reason why many of your present
day teachers and pastors only follow a three point rule of
interpretation, literal, historical, and grammatical, is because they
have seen the abuse that takes place when people arbitrarily
assign types and figures and pictures of Old Testament symbolism
and just mess up the whole thing by this arbitrary application. When a person arbitrarily interprets
scripture, they're basically using their own understanding,
their own wisdom, and saying this means this and that means
that and that means the other thing. And that happens because
typology must be regulated by underlying principles that basically
put parameters and framework around the typology. It's like
painting a picture without using a canvas. Am I making some sense? You gotta have a context in the
which to apply that typology. We call it covenant theology.
a covenant theology that says that God has a redemptive purpose
that he has employed in time, that he had before time, that
will work its way out through history and close in eternity.
And the center point of that redemptive purpose is Jesus Christ. and everything that's in Christ
is being gathered together in Christ throughout this redemptive
process. Now I'm being simple about this
right now for time's sake, but it's critical for you if you're
going to grow in your knowledge of God to understand that the
Bible is really, truly about Jesus. Alright, they don't do
it because of the abuse. The second reason they don't
do it is because they are unfamiliar with redemptive theology and
the framework of which I just spoke about. That that is needed
to keep the covenant purposes clear and therefore maintain
what we call the analogy of faith and scripture as the foundation
of their discourse when you properly comprehend the method of interpretation
that Jesus is talking about in Luke 24 You will see a clarity
and consistency of themes running through the scripture I'll touch
on a few today. As I develop my text, I'm going
to overlap touching Sunday school's class and you're going to, oh,
there it is again. Why? Because God is repeating
themes all the way through the Bible. to teach us facts about
his eternal counsel, so that they can be embedded in our understanding,
so that we can know this is what Jesus meant in Psalm 40 verse
7, when he said what? Lo, I come in the volume of the
book, it is written of me. I delight to do your will, O
God. So he will show us certain things
over and over and over again. And as he does that, we are progressively
working towards a final state of things. And in the progress
of this, what we call cycle of revelation is called a recapitulation
principle. He adds more detail. So that
essentially the bifocals that God gives you, being able to
see the scriptures historically, and then seeing his story through
them, you get to clean those bifocals over and over again. And you see more truth about
Jesus. Am I making some sense? follow
this now, then under this concept of the idea of biblical hermeneutic,
a Christocentric hermeneutic, our third statement is this. Truly preaching the gospel of
Christ in the Old Testament is what? Hard work. Anybody can
take a text of scripture and start running off at the mouth.
Anyone who has the gift of gab can entertain you for 35-40 minutes
or even longer if they're really good, not really actually associating
what they say with the text, or expounding the text, rightly
dividing the Word of God to bring clarity to the text. They can
hoodwink you with a lot of anecdotes and stories about the text and
never preach Christ. And you'll go away saying, man,
that was a good message. But I told you last week, if
it's not a godly message, it's not a good message, no matter
how good it makes you feel. No matter how good it makes you
feel. The reason why men do not do what we are suggesting must
be done to be a legitimate expository preacher is because the work
is hard. The work is hard. You got to
get your lazy butt up, preacher. Monday morning and go to work
on your text and bid God to show you Christ Show you the rules
that apply to that text the doctrinal aspect relative to that text
and Christ and then give you an ability to actually communicate
that in an expository fashion when you come together with your
people or otherwise you are actually what the proverb puts is darkening
counsel by words without knowledge and And so then under our third
point, here's what we say. We say then that truly preaching
the gospel of Christ in the Old Testament is hard work, but to
do it, you have to what? Love the testimony of Jesus.
God has to teach you to love the revelation of the glory of
God in Christ. That's 1 Peter 1.10. We won't go there. Secondly,
To do it, you have to submit to what we call the spirit of
prophecy. And the reason why I say that is because in Revelation
chapter 19 verse 10, John taught us that to be able to identify
a person who possesses the spirit of God and the spirit of prophecy,
you can know whether they have it by the content of their teaching. Revelation 19 10 tells us that
the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. Will y'all
hear me? Will you hear me now? If they
don't preach Christ, they don't have the Spirit. The goal of
the Spirit of God is to manifest the glory of God in Christ, reveal
Christ to you, augment Christ, blow Him up, make Him large,
make Him the thing you can't miss. Because the intention of
the Spirit of God is to reveal who God is to His elect. If you don't have the spirit
of Christ, it's evident because you don't exalt him. And so it's
very important for you and I to know that these are non-negotiable
rules. Don't waste your time in church
where Christ is not preached. Don't waste your time. Here's
the other one. To do it, you also must purposely and constantly
have a love for his appearance. When the Spirit of God is working
through the scriptures and the teacher has submitted himself
to the biblical rules of interpretation, the Spirit of God takes the teacher
and uses him as a mouthpiece to begin to reveal to you the
glory of God in Christ in the text. Prior to that exercise,
You did not see certain things in the text that were only made
plain by the spirit of god as the text was taught Am I telling
the truth? That's the work of the spirit of god and that's
what you want to experience when you come to church even if you
hear the same thing over and over and over Again, because
you can never get tired of the work of the spirit showing you
the same picture Showing you the same picture because you
need to know him You need to know him. This is critical. Then
the fourth thing I want to say about it is if Christ is the
subject of all the scriptures, five major things will be seen
as he appears in patterns and types and pictures and promises
and symbolism, metaphors, prophecies. Here are the five things that
you and I are going to experience as we go through the life of
David. And you are already experiencing
them in the life of Joseph. God will always demonstrate Christ's
calling when he deals with a typology his calling He will then show
you the humility of Christ That is Christ will always appear
in the scriptures in the humble state in the humble state of
a substitute for are a surety for his people. And in that humble
state, then he will go through a suffering paradigm. A suffering
paradigm, remember? Suffering and glory, right? Call,
humility, suffering, and then exaltation. Exaltation. He will
come up out of that suffering into a state of exaltation. Is
this not where Joseph is right now in the Genesis account? Exalted
to the right hand of Pharaoh. And then finally a state of what?
Glorification. That's how the Bible closes out.
That what we call redemptive excursion must be understood. You must understand His origin.
You must understand His humility. You must understand His suffering.
You must understand His exaltation. And you must understand His glory.
Because to the degree that you do, you see yourself in Christ,
who is in you the hope of glory. You and I, who are believers
in Christ, only have our true identity in so much as we understand
who he is, where he came from, what he went through, what he
accomplished, and where he is now. Are you guys hearing what
I'm saying? And as we watch the life of David, we're going to
learn a lot of things by way of application that's going to
help us understand why we are going through what we're going
through. It'll help you get through your journey. The other things
I want to say quickly then are, there are three benefits that
are derived from this Christocentric hermeneutic, which we simply
call preaching the gospel. That's all. We simply call it
preaching Christ. But what we mean by preaching
Christ is preaching Christ through the totality of the Bible. And
with the proper method that allows us not to abuse the text. So
that we can literally say, watch this, that's what the text is
teaching. That's what the text is meaning.
And so here's the last point under that as we move forward.
Three benefits that are derived. You learn the gospel of God's
eternal purposes in Christ. That's Ephesians 3, 9 and 11.
You see Christ in the panorama of his offices. The beauty about
Jesus is that he covers a number of offices. He's the Son of Man. He's the Son of God. He's the
servant. He's the king. He's the prophet.
He's the priest. He is the lamb of God. He is
the lion of the tribe of Judah. He carries many offices, does
he not? And every one of those offices are lessons about who
he is in our behalf. I want to know those things,
don't you? I want to know those things. I want to derive as many
blessings out of each office I possibly can because they are
given to me by God that I might know God. through Christ in a
redeeming and a saving way. So then the benefits are you
learn the gospel of God's eternal purpose in Christ. You see Christ
in the panorama of his offices and then you see yourself in
Christ through the person typifying him. This is going to be good. This series will take us all
the way to the end of the year. We will learn things about David
even today that you never do. And in learning things about
David, you're going to learn some things about who? Christ. And
in learning some things about Christ, you're going to learn
some things about who else? Myself. And that's the reason we are
here. We need a mirror raised up so we can see our wretched,
miserable, funky selves. being handled by a God of all
grace and mercy, who was able to take us from the dunghill
and raise us on high with princes. Is that true? We get a lot of
hope when we see our Savior, do we not? And that's what's
going to take place here. Now let me say one more thing
by way of introduction into our text. Arguably, the greatest
Old Testament type in the Bible is Joseph. Arguably. But Joseph
carries for us what we call the central objective of the impeccability
of Christ. Meaning he does have an origin,
a humility, a suffering, an exaltation, a glorification. We see that.
But centrally Joseph is designed to show us the impeccability
and the purity of Christ's nature. God does not allow us to see
Joseph's sin. There is no building a doctrine
around Joseph as a prototype of Jesus Christ, as we're going
to learn with David. Most other types in the scripture
God allows the sin to be manifested so that as John the Baptist says
I confess and I did not not that I am not the Christ all I do
is point to him and So most of your types in the Old Testament
will teach us about how we are not like Jesus I will develop
that here too with Joseph. You don't see any sin. I And
it shows us the impeccableness of the office of him as the servant
son. Now you guys remember I share
with you three major covenant paradigms critical to understanding
the scriptures. Y'all remember those three covenant
major paradigms? Here they are. Father, son. What
else? King, servant. What else? Husband,
wife. Please hear me. Those three covenant
models cover the whole and totality of your Bible. And wherever you
are dealing with a type, you must identify whether or not
we are dealing with a father-son paradigm, a king-servant paradigm,
or a husband-wife paradigm, which is the last covenant paradigm
in our Bible, right? We're moving towards the, what
we call, end of God's redemptive purpose, where the son has a
bride that he's gonna marry. But now watch this. The son who
has a bride that he's gonna marry is also the servant of the king. And the servant of the king is
also the son of the father. So that these three overlap,
do they not? God the father sends the son.
The son is the servant who becomes the king, who marries the bride. This is really all about the
father and the son and the father giving a bride to the son because
the son was an obedient servant. Are y'all hearing me? Father,
son, king, servant, husband, wife. You're going to see all
that in our narrative. With these rules, you'll be able
to keep yourself safe when you're reading through your Bible. Ask
God to open your eyes and show you these three covenant paradigms
because we all play a part in that paradigmatic structure since
God created us in his image. Don't we all have a daddy? I
hope you do. Are we not all sons? Yes, we
are. That's in the genitive sense. Are we all not servants? And
many of us have experienced the last paradigm of a husband-wife
paradigm with the reproductive benefits and blessings of bearing
children, have we not? So the scriptures are very relevant
in our life in terms of God's eternal purpose in Christ. You
are also going to see as we work through this today how fierce
the devil works to destroy every objective of God. and how that
without faith, it's impossible to please God. I introduce you
now to King David. I say that Joseph is the quintessential
type, arguably, but David is what we call the exhaustive,
comprehensive type of Christ, par excellence. And here's what
I mean by that. 213 times you have Joseph mentioned
in the Old Testament. He's mentioned only once in the
New Testament, Revelation 7, 8. 1,075 times is David mentioned
in the Old Testament. That's crazy. Now watch this. But in the New Testament, David
is mentioned 59 times compared to Joseph's once. Why? Because
the New Testament is the fleshing out of the son of David. Who
is the son of David? And he sits on his throne fulfilling
the Davidic kingdom right now as God's son ruling over all
things. Matthew's chapter 1 verse 1 opens up with David. Matthew's
1 1. Revelation chapter 22 16 closes
the Bible with Jesus speaking in the first person calling himself
the root of David and the offspring of David. That means he's David's
God and he's David's son and he closes out using David's name
as his own. Do you see what I mean by how
involved and how comprehensive and how rich and how expansive
the concept of David is? I want you to learn what the
prophets have already said is David is Jesus in perfection. David is Jesus in perfection. That's the way the prophets projected
the prophecy of King David sitting on his throne ruling over everyone
and everything. Having said that, let's then
deal with our text briefly for a little while today. And I trust
that you will enjoy this unfolding. In chapter 16 of 1 Samuel, what
we have is a very precarious situation because God has rejected
King Saul from ruling. Now he has rejected King Saul
from ruling because King Saul was not God's choice. Mark it
down. He was the people's choice, head
and shoulders above the rest, the most auspicious person in
the kingdom. He was handsome. He was dark. He was on an empirical level,
everything the people wanted, and God gave him to them. But Saul was not God's choice. And over time, Saul messed up
really bad, didn't he? And God finally said, hey, I've
rejected Saul. Saul's not going to be my king.
I want you to hear how it's constructed in verse 1 of chapter 16. Pull
it up. Here it is. And the Lord said unto Samuel,
how long will you mourn for Saul? Seeing I have what? Rejected
him from reigning over Israel. Now watch the instruction here.
Fill your horn with oil and go I will send you to Jesse the
Bethlehemite for I have provided what me a king among his sons. This is where we enjoy and love
the King James version. The construction here in the
English emphasizes that the king that God is going to annoy is
one like himself. Just as he had told Abraham the
Lord had provided himself a lamb for a sacrifice, pointing to
the second person of the blessed Godhead, Jesus Christ himself.
We get to now mark that out and understand that God's here solving
his own problems. If you're going to get it right,
do what? Do it yourself. And that's what God is doing
in the redemption of our souls, right? We're going to learn a
lot of things about the parody between the false and the true.
Between the flesh and the spirit. Between faith and works. Between
law and grace. Between the first Adam and the
last Adam. Because Saul represents the first
Adam, David represents the last Adam. And the two are at odds. This is quite remarkable. Then
so under your first point, because I want you to see it in your
point, the calling of David. He was called in the midst of
what? Controversy. Point A. He was called in the midst of
controversy. I love this. God waited until
things got bad to call David. Are you hearing echoes right
now? Right. So I want you to get this now.
He was caught in the midst of controversy. This is why in the
opening chapter, you got God saying to Saul, I mean to Samuel,
Samuel, quit tripping, brother. Now, what is Samuel doing? Samuel
is struggling over the fact that now for some 10 years plus, he
has gotten to like this king called Saul. who has been messing
up all over the place. Stay with me, because this is
the human element that fills in the spaces between the redemptive
paradigm and you and me. Samuel has started to like Saul,
and he started to like the fact that we got a king on the throne,
the monarchy is rolling, and everybody's rolling with Saul.
And then all of a sudden, God tells Samuel, I'm done with him.
And then he gives him a very hard job. which I have taught
you before. This is how you know when God
has called you to an assignment. When God tells you to do something
and you start thinking about that assignment and you realize
the liability here. That's how you know God's calling
you to it. Because all assignments require humility and faith. You
have to believe that God sees stuff that you don't see. Because
once you start looking at the stuff you see and think that
the stuff you see is all there is, you're going to start equivocating
on God's call in your life. He told Saul, Samuel, listen,
quit mourning, quit grieving, and don't fear this dude. Now,
on a human level, it makes sense. If Samuel goes and anoints David
as king and we already got one, civil war will break out. And
the first person to die will be Samuel. Because we know now
that Saul was so empty of grace, so empty of mercy, so empty of
principle that he was willing to kill his own son when his
own son disobeyed him. Am I telling the truth? Samuel
had everything to fear so long as he was walking by what sight
and not by what that's the rule We're gonna learn as we make
our way through the text with Samuel just to let you know on the human
level God is not denying the fact that we struggle So then
the second sub point is not only was David called in the midst
of controversy Because the kingdom was ripped from Samuel from King
Saul. He was called in the midst of
family. What I Now let's watch this in the text right quick.
Look at verse 10 and 12 in our text. In verse 10, we read these
words. And again, Jesse made his seven
sons to pass before Samuel. And Samuel said unto Jesse, the
Lord hath not what? Now look at verse 11. And Samuel
said unto Jesse, are here all thy children? Now why on earth
is Samuel having to ask that question? Can I tell you why?
Because the principle of rejection that you learned this morning
on the part of the person who is designated to suffer is here
being alluded. David is being rejected by his
family. He's even being rejected by his
father. And that rejection centers in
on the atonement that we will deal with down the line. The
nature and character of Christ's calling is rejection. But I'm
getting into my third point when I talk about that. You'll see
over in chapter 17 where Jesse's are David's brothers will demonstrate
their hatred of David as well. When Samuel asked this question,
there's an insight that I want you to capture as we work our
way through this point to show how that even Samuel succumbed
to the spirit of the age of that time walking carnally. Look back
with me at verse 3. And he said to Jesse, He called
Jesse to the sacrifice. And he says, I will show you
what you shall do. You shall anoint unto me him.
This is God telling Samuel this. And it says over in verse 4,
And Samuel did that which the Lord spake, and came to Bethlehem
the elders of the town. And they trembled and said, Do
you come peaceably? This implies that Samuel, being
a prophet, was feared by the people. He said, Peaceably. I
am come to sacrifice unto the Lord. Sanctify yourselves. Come
with me to the sacrifice. He sanctified Jesse and his sons,
and he called them to the sacrifice. Now, it came to pass when they
were come, now I want you to watch this language in verse
six, that Samuel looked on who? And he said, surely the Lord's
anointed is right here. Now, the Spirit of God did this
to teach you and me how that by nature, we neither see nor
want Jesus Christ. By nature, we neither see nor
want him. I'm going to show you something
as this unfolds. And because the Lord interrupted and told
Samuel, this is not to do, even though his name is nice. My God
is the father, Eliab. That wasn't him. And he kept
rolling through all the sons, right? Samuel became a little
frustrated. Do you know why? Because Samuel
was looking for a person who looked like Saul. This is what
happens when the church starts to go apostate and it starts
following the principles of the world and starts using worldly,
as it were, measures to determine what success is. This is what
happens in leadership when leadership is interested in a popular preacher
instead of a faithful preacher. When they start looking for the
resume of an individual they think will be accepted with the
people and not with God. So Samuel here is falling into
the same trap, is he not? And God had to show Samuel, as
we're getting ready to deal with here in the text, that it's not
so. So we look again as we are working
through our first point, our sub point here, he was called
in the midst of family rejection. Point number C, he was called
by God according to the rule of what? Now faith is the substance
of things hoped for. The evidence of things what?
Samuel made the mistake of walking in the flesh. I want you to mark
how God corrects Samuel in verses 6 through 8. I'm going to start
here at verse 6. And it came to pass when they
were come that he looked on Eliab and said, surely this is the
Lord's anointed that is before him. Verse 7. But the Lord said
unto Samuel, look not on his what? Or on his what? Because I have refused him Now
that's all that matters if God has refused you. I don't care
how many people vote for you. You're God's adversary Now I
want you to mark what God says here For man looks on the what? but the Lord looks on the heart.
Do you see that? Man looks on the outward, but
God looks on the heart. Children of God, God had already
told Samuel back in the ninth chapter, I have found a man for
me after my own heart. He had already told Samuel that
the choice that God makes has nothing to do with appearance.
It has everything to do with the heart. Are you hearing me?
that the choice that God makes in service has nothing to do
with your external observation and conclusions about who they
are. You and I will get it wrong every
time if we judge a man based upon our human limited criteria. Every time. If Samuel, who is
a great Old Testament priest and prophet, got it wrong, wouldn't
we get it wrong? Now I'm going to show you something
in the text that's going to be quite remarkable as we work it
through. Look at verse eight. Then Jesse
called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel. And he said,
neither hath the Lord chosen him. Then Jesse made Shammah
and the rest. And the Lord said, these are
not those. Verse 11. And Samuel said unto Jesse, are
here all your sons? There remains yet one, says Jesse.
And behold, he what? Keeps the sheep. And Samuel said
unto Jesse, send and fetch him here, for we will not sit down
till he comes hither. Let me let you see what takes
place here. Verse 12 and 13. And he sent and brought unto
him. Now he sent and brought him in. Now he was ready and
with all a beautiful continence and goodly to look to. Now watch
this. And the Lord said, Arise, anoint
him for this is he. Then Samuel took the horn of
oil and anointed him in the midst of his brethren. And the Spirit
of God came upon him from that day forward. So Samuel rose up
and went to Ramah. I'm gonna go to work here a little
bit and help you understand three or four things before we move
to our second point quickly. I want you to know that when
God finally brought David into the presence of Samuel, that
the text that we're reading about David being ruddy and of a handsome
countenance and all of that, goodly to look on, was an omen. It served as what we call a paradox
or a anti-type to Jesus Christ. And it's designed to warn you
and me that if God makes a concession because of the weakness of our
flesh, we're going to be disciplined. I want you to see this. Didn't
God just say, don't look on the outward man? Didn't God just
say, don't look on the appearance and measure by what he looks
like? And yet now we have David who's now been qualified by how
he appears. Whoa, Lord, what are you doing? He's teaching us what we call
the anti-typical picture in relationship to the archetype, Jesus. Jesus
is never given to us in a pictured form with regards to beauty or
handsomeness or anything carnal. Contrary to the why. What we
know about our master is that he was of such a continence that
we all rejected him. There was no beauty in him that
we should desire him. His visage was more and more
than any man. The antitype that saves your
soul does not have as his qualifications the appearance of the flesh.
Mark it then that while David is a great type of Jesus, the
type and the reality are miles apart. And where you and I fall
prey to the type, we're gonna fall prey to the error that the
type brings in. I submit to you while we're gonna
learn a lot about David, we're gonna learn a lot about David's
vanity, about David's sinfulness, about David weakness, about his
humanity, things that you would never see in the greater David
who redeems your soul. Am I making some sense? God is
showing us as he teaches us the larger kingdom paradigm here
is that he accommodates our weaknesses, but we will pay for it. Another couple of truths under
this particular point that I want to allude to that's in your outline. Point number four, he was anointed
by God in the what? Presence of the elders. Do you
see that? He had anointed David in the presence of his brethren,
verse 13. Then Samuel took the horn of
oil and anointed him in the midst of his brethren, and the Spirit
of the Lord came upon David from that day forward. So Samuel rose
up and went. Now I want you to mark in verse
13 a couple of things. One is the presence of the Spirit
of the Lord was upon David for the purpose of qualifying him
to lead, not for the purpose of creating salvation in him.
The presence of the Spirit of God here is what we call for
the anointing of service, not for the conversion of the soul.
David was already a believer in Christ. He was already a child
of the Son of God. But when you occupy an office,
whether it's a pastor, or an elder, or a deacon, or in the
Old Testament, whether you were the priest, prophet, or king,
you needed the anointing of the Spirit of God, because all of
those offices are messianic in nature. and that without God's
help you could not occupy that office for one moment. Now I
don't have time today to show you the antitopical picture between
David and Saul. But here's what I will say. When
the text says he anointed David in the presence of his brethren,
he did not do that with King Saul. In 1 Samuel chapter 9 the
text tells us that Samuel anointed King Saul in private. Why did
he do that pastor? Because God knew that King Saul
would make a mess of his office. And he did not want his spirit
to be identified with that bad behavior that wicked and ungodly
rulers engaged in so that people who would say, well, he's still
the anointed of the Lord. He's still got the spirit of
God, even though he's committing adultery and fornication and
all kinds of wickedness. No, he does it. Are you hearing me? The greater
reason for which he was anointed in the presence of his brethren
was to bear record to the principle out of the mouth of two or three
witnesses. Let every word be established. Are you guys hearing
me? God was comfortable with anointing
David in the presence of his brethren, in the presence of
the elders. order to let them know that he was the man got
that God approved of are you guys hearing what I'm saying
all right now let's tie the knot then under our second our third
point then in our outline second point rather as David what so
was Jesus Christ as David no I'm sorry I got one point left
under our first point he was called as a shepherd to shepherd
God's people do you see that that's verse 11 Samuel said unto
Jesse are here all thy children and he said there remains yet
the youngest and behold he what and Behold he what I want you
to mark that because as we make our way out of the train station
and start rolling down the road and Understanding what God is
accomplishing redemptively. You're gonna learn some things
between David and and Saul that are contrasts that actually highlight
and augment principles of leadership when God has called you to leadership. You remember what I stated earlier?
God has sought a man after his own heart. You guys got that?
That's a troubling passage if you don't have a corollary passage
to explain it. Because none of us in here would
be comfortable with God looking at our heart. Tell the truth.
and then determining whether or not he's going to use us based
upon our heart. I'm sure if God looked on my
heart as bad as it is, he wouldn't use me. And what does he therefore
mean that David was a man after his own heart? Does it mean that
David was better than other men? You guys learned better than
that in Sunday school, didn't you? All have what? And did what?
Keep on coming short. Before and after conversion,
right? So what do we mean when we say that he has found a man
after his own heart? Psalm 78 itself declares that
David was God's servant. For time's sake, I'm just going
to leave it right there. Here's what this means. When God approves
of a man, he makes him his servant. And a servant is a person who
obeys his master. no matter how he feels. And that's
what God is calling for in leadership. Leadership cannot govern merely
on their feelings. They have to obey the word of
God. And this is going to emerge in the life of David on a number
of areas to show us what it means. Because if it was left up to
our natural heart, God is very plain in the Proverbs, hell and
destruction. are before the Lord, how much
more so the hearts of the children of men. In other words, you know
what's in your heart? Hell and destruction. Get that. God can't use that nasty thing.
He has to throw it out and put in a new heart, and then he has
to operate that heart himself in order for you to do his will.
Well, we're going to learn some things about David with regards
to that. The other thing that I'm stating here is that not
only is David here a man after God's own heart, that is being
a servant, But David was being prepared to serve God in the
public office because of his service in keeping what she keeping
sheep David kept his father's sheep. Is that what it says?
David kept his father's sheep, but I want you to mark that when
it came to King Saul King Saul was not a sheep keeper. Do you
know that? King Saul was not a sheep you these are the contrast
between the two and It's quite interesting. King Saul, when
God allowed Samuel to bring him up to serve the people's lust,
was out hunting down his daddy's asses. I love the contrast. I know you're in church, but
you can work with this. I thank God for having an eternal
purpose and counsel before the world began, and I thank him
for his electing love and his predestinating grace. And I don't
mind God saying that in the kingdom, human beings are typified by
animals. Zoomorphisms is what we call it. The non-elect are
called asses, and the elect are called sheep. And one of the
omens that we're gonna see here shortly is that the reason for
which God rejected Saul is because when his daddy lost his asses,
Saul could not find him. It was at that time that Samuel
intervened and told Saul, look, dude, don't worry about the asses.
We'll take care of that. Me and God will take care of
that. You come on over here because we're going to use you as a pattern
of when people ask for what they want, they get it. This dude
couldn't even recover asses. How he going to take care of
sheep? And the Bible's clear. My sheep hear my voice. And they follow me and I give
them to them eternal life and they shall never perish And we
have a good shepherd who is such that he will leave the 99 In
the wilderness and he'll hunt down that one sheep so that the
scripture says of all that the father have given me I have lost
none We have a great shepherd, don't we? This is worship time
right here because david as a great type of our lord. Jesus christ
is a good shepherd He is a chief shepherd. He is a great shepherd. And all who are under his care
will be taken care of. This is the typology pattern
that we're getting in David. And it's pointing to Christ,
which now moves me to my second point. As David, so with Christ.
Christ also was called in the midst of what? Was he not born
at a time when King Herod wanted to kill him? Why? Because he
was the son of David. What's going on in that paradigm?
Two kings. The Lilliputian king on the earthly
level and God's king David, right? Even when the boy was a little
baby, didn't Herod go after him to kill him? Samuel had every
reason to fear, did he not? Do you guys see the parallels
between the old and the new? Lo, I come in the volume of the
book. It's written of me to do thy will. Then the second paradigm
under that, which is very important to follow then, is Christ was
called also to a people, what? As David was rejected, was not
Christ also rejected? He came unto his own and his
own received him not. The world was made by him and
the world knew him not. Everybody rejected Jesus, did
they not? He was rejected by everyone and
even for a moment rejected by his God, was he not? Isaiah chapter
53 said we all esteemed him stricken and smitten and afflicted of
God We turned everyone away from him. We all rejected him This
is the rejection paradigm and I'm showing you the parallels
between David and Jesus. Are you guys beginning to see
them? I have to lay down this foundation because once we start
moving into the practical active narrative You're gonna have to
know these principles because I'm not explaining them again.
I You will have to ask God to help you see how the narrative
unfolds, particularly as we move from chapter to chapter. Under
our second point then, let's consider our third sub-point.
Not only was Christ called to a people rejecting Him, but He
was anointed by God in the presence of the rulers, was He not? Come
on now preacher, now you're stretching it. No, I'm not. His anointing
took place at the River Jordan. in the public presence of all
the Jews and the rulers where God opened the heavens and said,
this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. Is that true?
And the one ruler that God had accepted, his name was what?
John the Baptist. He pointed to him so that God
publicly anointed Jesus as his servant. He didn't do it in the
corner. He didn't hide it like he did
with Saul. He did it publicly as he did with David in the presence
of his brethren and in the presence of the rulers. Are you guys following
what I'm saying? The typology is there. The pattern
is there. We're laying down the foundation so that when we continue
in the studies down the line, it will be a real blessing to
us. Fourthly then, Christ is the true shepherd prophesied
in Ezekiel and typified in David. I need to look at these verses
briefly. Ezekiel chapter 34 verse 11.
Look at Ezekiel 34 verse 11. We're going to look at verse
12, 23, and 24 and mark you the era and epic in which these verses
and promises are given by Ezekiel is in the post-exilic period
where Israel has gone into Babylonian captivity. So we're not talking
about the days of David. David is dead, been dead for
a long time. And how is it in Ezekiel chapter
34, 11 we're going to be talking about David? Notice what it says
in verse 11. For thus said the Lord God, behold,
I even I will search my sheep and seek them out. Verse 12,
as a shepherd seeks out his flock in the day that he is among his
sheep that are what? Has God done that for you? Has
he hunted you down in the person of the Lord Jesus by the Spirit
of God through the preaching of the gospel? Did he find you
in that pit in which you were in and bring you out and put
you on his shoulders and bring you back to the fold? Notice,
so will I seek out my sheep and I will deliver them out of all
places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day. Now
watch this. And I will bring them out from
the people and gather them from the countries and bring them
to their own land and feed them upon the mountains of Israel.
He talks about all of these magnificent promises. Look with me now over
at verse 23 and 24, because I want you to see it here. Verse 23.
I will set up one shepherd. Who is that shepherd? Jesus! Isn't that John's Gospel chapter
10? I'm the good shepherd. Other sheep have I that are not
of this fold. I must bring them in and there
will be one fold and one what? Shepherd. David or rather Ezekiel
is prophesying of Jesus but watch how he uses the name David. And I will set up one shepherd
over them, and he shall feed them, even my what? That's my
word. That's my term. A man after my
own heart? A what? Servant. What's his name?
David. Here it is. He shall feed them,
and he shall be their shepherd. And I, the Lord God, will be
their God. And my servant David, a prince
among them, I, the Lord, have spoken it. And finally, under
our second point, David kept his father's sheep. Do you see
that? Saul's father's asses were what? I'll develop that a little
bit later on down the line when David reiterates his qualifications
in the presence of King Saul. I just wanted you guys to get
that. Let's do what our final point then, because this now
is going to move us into the narrative for next week. Look
at verses 13 through 16 of our text. These are my final points.
Verses 13 through 16 of our text. This is quite interesting and
necessary for you to understand about the Aspect of Christ's
humility and his suffering in his humility as the servant King
Now thus far we have been given To see how David was called by
God under these very precarious circumstances We have seen the
tensions and the conflicts emerging right the problems But now notice
what God calls David to do In verse 13, we read these words.
Do you guys see that? Now I want you to mark this. Mark this. It takes the Spirit
of God to serve. It takes the Spirit of God to serve. I want
you to get this now. I want you to get this now. Because the next three verses
are going to be a couplet between David and Saul. And Saul remains
king. And David becomes Saul's servant. Do you see the paradigm already?
Do you see the paradigm between Christ and us? How that though
Christ is king, he came to do what? And how that in order for
him to serve, he had to be what? Anointed. It takes the anointing
to serve because one of the rules of the crystal centric revelation
of Christ is that he's called to humility. It takes the grace
of God to be humble. Now, you know, it's going to
take a lot of grace in David's life to sit under this knucklehead
king. And you and I are going to learn
a lot about the conflict between the flesh and the spirit. In
a dimension and time where you and I are promised to rule But
right now we're called to what? Serve. And in the midst of our
service, we got a king that we got to fight against called the
flesh. And in order to overcome that,
we have to know how to walk in the anointing of service. Are
you guys hearing what I'm saying? Mark how this falls out. This
is going to be very important now. This is my last point. You can
go home and eat, gain some weight. Then Samuel took the oil, anointed
him, and the spirit of God came upon David from that day forward. Mark the contrast. King Saul
had the spirit temporarily. David had the spirit permanently.
Watch this. But the spirit of the Lord, verse
14, did what? Departed from Saul. Do you see
it? The narrative is telling us that
there was a transition of favor in terms of the anointing of
the spirit that was in the life of King Saul taken off of Saul
and put on who? But watch this, while David is
anointed, David is not appointed. The appointment remains in the
life of the king. But these two dimensions are
going to be coexisting together and that's what creates the conflict.
You are going to see the conflict between the outer man and the
inner man. Between the one that's exalted
and the one that's humble. Between the master and his servant. between the one who is a son
and the one who is marked out by all as being the head, being
a father type. Here's what it says in verse
15. And Saul's servant said unto him, Behold now an evil spirit
from God troubled thee to be developed later on. Verse 16. Let our Lord now command thy
servants which are before thee to seek out a man who is a cunning
player on a heart. And it shall come to pass when
the evil spirit from God is upon thee. I'm looking forward to
explaining that construction right there. Because most theologians
scatter in 500 directions when God owns the sovereign right
over every creature in the universe to dispatch him at his will. To do His bidding, because as
we learned in Romans 9, the nature of God is that He is both love
and justice at the same time. Mercy and wrath at the same time. And God rules all creatures in
His sovereign, inscrutable judgment to punish some and to bless others. Every devil is God's devil. Every devil is God's dog that
God uses to do his bidding when he wants to. And God has no problem
letting the world know I rule over everything. I rule over
everything. I made all things for myself,
even the wicked for the day of evil. And so the construction
allows us to recognize that God is first cause. And while he
is, he never sins. He never sins. when he allows
the wickedness of men to bear the fruits of sin. Are you guys
hearing what I'm saying? Mark it now as I finish. Verse
17, and Saul said unto his servants, provide me now a man that can
play well and bring him to me, because I got a headache. Then
answered one of the servants and said, behold, look at Providence,
I have seen a son of Jesse, the Bethlehemite, and that brother
can play the guitar. a mighty man of value, a man
of war, prudent in matters, and a comely person. And the Lord
is what? Now, somebody knows something
about this brother, don't they? We think he can make a good worship
minister. Watch it. Watch it. Wherefore,
Saul sent messengers unto Jesse and said, Send me now David thy
son. which is with the sheep. See,
the Spirit of God keeps repeating these principles because we're
laying down a resume that you've got to get. I see this stuff
four chapters down the line, and you will too if you're patient.
But these things are laid down for us to get it. As Romans 15,
four said, those things that were written four times, they
were written for our learning, that we through patience and
consolation of the scriptures might have what? Hope. That's
why they're laid down. Every word of God is true. Every word of God is pure, tried
in a furnace of fire seven times. Not one of God's words are irrelevant,
insignificant, superfluous, redundant. You and I have to pay attention.
Am I making some sense? Almost done. Watch this. He says
in verse 21, and David came to Saul and stood before him and
he loved him greatly and became his what? Saul sent to Jesse
saying let David I pray thee stand before me for he had found
favor in my sight and it came to pass when the evil spirit
from God was upon Saul that David took a heart that's a keyboard
y'all For those of y'all don't know no better and played with
his hands So Saul was refreshed and was well and the evil spirit
departed from him for a minute So I want you to see in our last
point, I'm just going to articulate it. These are principles for
you and me. We're done. Our last point. As it pulls up,
here it is. Christ, the soothing servant
of sinners. Do you see it? Christ, the soothing
servant for sinners. I want you to get it. See, you
and I, If we fail to understand that if God grants us to see
the movie script and see all the characters in the script,
if you and I fail to understand the big picture, you and I will
think that if anything, we fit David's type. We don't fit Saul's
type. I got news for you. You fit Saul's
type more than you fit David's type. Are you hearing me? It's
very important for you to capture that. and therefore you need
a servant king like David and like Jesus to play the wonderful
gospel song to soothe your soul because you're a hell-bound sinner
and especially outside of Christ listen to me outside of Christ
the songs of Zion outside of Christ the song of redemption
outside of Christ the wonderful melody of grace and mercy forgiveness
of sins is what you need. You need the healing balm of
Gilead. You need somebody that can play
well on an instrument and soothe your hell-bound soul because
you're tormented by your sins and by the false appearance of
your authority. You and I are like King Saul
while we're outside of Christ. And we share the gospel of this
wonderful message of redemption with the hope that not only will
it be pleasing to your ears, come unto me, all ye that labor
and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved from your sins. He is
merciful and he is gracious. He is a high priest that ever
lives to make intercession for those that come unto him. Come
sinner, come sinner to Christ and receive the mercy that only
he can give to you. That's a wonderful song. That's
a wonderful song for a sinner that is tormented by his sin. You need that song. You need
that song. And I'll tell you what, those
who are saved and regenerate need to sit under that same song.
Sit right there with King Saul. and hear the same message, and
ask God to bless your soul. Because sometimes, even in a
safe state, your heart is hard, and you don't rejoice in the
gospel, and you sit there cold as ice, and you need to be shouting
and thanking God for His mercy. Hard, hard. You've been sat under
the songs of Zion year after year, and your heart are hard. while we pray that God works
through the soothing Savior to save sinners. Lord, pour that
song in my heart. Give me some of that grace. Warm
my heart up right now. I'm a sinner just like Saul,
saving the grace of God. Pour your grace on us all, because
you are the God alone that can save me. You are the God alone
that can keep me. You are the God alone that can
watch over my soul. Don't think that you are not
from time to time just like King Saul. Christ, the soothing servant
of sinners. Troubles of a rebel king. Why? Without the Spirit of God. I'm
gonna leave it right there for now. I'll get back later. Second,
the gospel is a superficial comfort to rebels. I warn you religious
folk. King Saul was religious too. He was a Benjamite. He was an
Israelite. He went to church all his life.
He heard the gospel and rejected it. I warn you. I warn you. Don't be a Saul. Finally, Christ
the servant of kings before reigning as king. Isaiah chapter 49 verse
7. It tells us in that text as she
pulls it up, that he is the one whom God anointed and all the
nations despised him. But he was a servant of rulers.
Isn't that amazing? Our God serving rulers. Thus
said the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel and His Holy One, to whom
men what? And we all did to him whom the
nations abhorred to a servant of rulers kings shall see and
arise princes also shall worship because of the lord that is faithful
and the holy one of israel and he shall choose thee our final
verse on that matter then is philippians chapter 2 i think
that's in our text philippians chapter 2 verse 7 this is a lesson
that you and i want to acquire we're kings by right in christ
We are princes and princesses, by right, in Christ. But right
now in this world, we are servants. And if there's one thing you
and I want to learn how to do, it's serve. Serve. Even under wicked kings, even
under ungodly kings, even under unsaved spouses, unsaved parents. The greatest way to picture Christ
in this dimension until we visibly rule with him, is to serve like
David did. Find your gift like David had
a gift, and use it for the cause of the gospel. And remember,
the man's position is the position from God. You don't get to despise
the position. And learn what David did, and
learn what Jesus did, and let us all follow that model. May
he give us grace to do it. But he made himself a what? See,
there you go. Told you it's not time to shine.
And he took upon himself the form of what? Dulaw slave. Slave. That's our master. That's
our calling. Did this make sense to you? Amen.