preparation for these messages
on the books of the scripture, I have been constantly challenged
and have constantly been taught, I believe by God's Spirit, things
I haven't seen before. And I trust that you will be
as well. And my heart, I hope I'm not
deceived, my heart has been blessed and I hope as a result through
my life and ministry you will be and that you will be a blessing
to others. Tonight I want to give you the
message of 1 Chronicles. You'll see the direction of my
message and the direction of the message of this book in chapter
15 and verse 13. I reserve comment concerning
it until I get there, but let's read it together. David says,
Because you did it not at the first, the Lord our God made
a breach upon us, for that we sought him not after the due
order. Now, this book of 1 Chronicles
was written after the Jews returned from their 70 years of captivity
in Babylon. It was probably written by Ezra,
the priest, who also wrote the book of Ezra. He was one of the
remarkable men who returned from the captivity in Babylon to reestablish
the temple and the worship of God in Jerusalem. 1 Chronicles,
historically, covers the same period in Israel's history, basically,
as is covered by 2 Samuel. But in 1 Chronicles there is
a distinct emphasis on instruction, instruction in the worship of
God. This book is not so much a book of history as are the
other books of history, like 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings. This book is about God's team,
God's ark, and God's worship. You might compare it with the
Gospel of John. Turn over to John, if you will,
chapter 20. Hold your hands here, let me show you the comparison. You know that the first three
Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke, are what we call synoptic Gospels.
They are called synoptic gospels because they all three give us
a more or less chronological, synoptic order of our Lord's
earthly life and ministry and his accomplishments as our Savior
and our Redeemer. But the gospel of John doesn't
follow any kind of chronological order at all. The gospel of John
is different. in that John's purpose is not
to give us at all a historic record of what the Lord did while
he was upon this earth. Rather, John's purpose is to
teach us the meaning of all that our Lord did. Look at this in
verse 30. John says this concerning his
book. And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of
his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these
are written, these things that I have written." Now, John's
gospel was the last book to be written in the New Testament.
It was written somewhere between 90 and 95 A.D. It was written
after all the rest of the Bible was written. And John says, now,
these are written for this purpose. that you might believe that Jesus
is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might
have life through his name." In other words, John says, I
have written my history not just to give you historic facts, But
I have written my history by divine inspiration so that you
who read this book might believe on the Son of God, that you might
know that Jesus of Nazareth is indeed the Son of God, as all
the prophets testified he was. He made no attempt to cover the
whole of our Lord's earthly ministry. But rather he carefully selected
certain things to demonstrate that he is the Christ, the Messiah,
the Son of God, our Savior, our Redeemer, as spoken of in all
the Old Testament. Now, let's go back to 1 Chronicles. The first nine chapters are tedious
reading. They are just tedious. There
are nine chapters of names, virtually nothing else, just names. These
names record the genealogies going all the way back to Adam
and extending up to and through the time of Judah's captivity,
or Israel's captivity in Babylon. I don't know if you're like I
am or not, but when I run across these genealogical records and
start to read them, my eyes kind of tend to glaze over. I try
never to read them just before I go to bed. And I'm kind of
tempted to sort of skip over them. I feel sort of like a preacher,
an old preacher I read about recently. He was reading from
Matthew chapter 1, and he started out reading, Abraham begat Isaac,
and Isaac begat Jacob, and Jacob begat Judah and his brethren.
And then he did what only old preachers could get by with.
He said they kept on begetting one another all the way down
this side of the page, clear over to the other side, and then
he picked up with the reading. But let's not read it that way. These genealogies have a distinct
purpose. They are given by divine inspiration. They are not only records of
historic family lines, they are records given to teach us that
give us first an indisputable chronological connection with
regard to all the historic facts revealed in the Old Testament.
Any time someone attempts to say, well, this couldn't have
happened here, that couldn't have happened there, it's out
of chronological order, go find the place where these genealogies
are, and you'll see exactly how they fit chronologically. Not
only that, they show us a clear and indisputable record that
our Savior is indeed the Son of Abraham, the Son of David,
according to the flesh. He is that one who is Abraham's
promised seed. He is that one who is David's
promised son. In fact, he is the only person
now living who is positively known to be of David's seed,
possessing a right thereby to David's throne. Those who live
over across the water in Palestine, I don't doubt at all they are
physical Jews, that's a fact. But not one of them has any idea
what his genealogical connection is. God fixed it so that they
can never discover that. Why? Because their physical genealogy
doesn't matter after Christ has come. He is the one of whom the
genealogies speak. Of all the things the Jews questioned,
they raised questions and they raised accusations and they made
charges that were ill-founded. But of all the charges they made,
of all the questions they raised, never once did any scribe or
Pharisee or priest, never once did any of the rulers of the
Jews challenge our Lord's genealogy, because it was too clear. It
could not be disputed. This man is indeed David's son. This man is indeed Abraham's
son. That cannot be disputed. But
there's more. The genealogies show us the movement
of God's providence toward the goal for which this world was
created. They show us the movement of
God's providence ruling everything to bring everything to its culminating
point in the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ and the accomplishment
of redemption by him and at last his resurrection glory. As they
do so, The genealogies give us a picture of God's sovereign
electing grace. You see, throughout the record
of the scriptures, Old Testament and new, in all things physical
and spiritual, the Lord God chooses some and rejects others. He always does. He very carefully,
very meticulously shows us how that he chooses one to be the
object of his grace, one to be the means by which he works,
and passes by another. Let me see if I can illustrate
it for you from the record here, and you can read it In the genealogies
given in these nine chapters, the Spirit of God reaches all
the way back to the dawn of human history and begins with Adam. And he mentions Adam's sons,
Seth, Enos, Canaan, and Mahalio. Well, wait a minute. What about
Cain and Abel? What about Cain and Abel? Abel,
of course, was killed by his brother Cain, and of Cain there
is no mention. And then the focus is not upon
any of the rest of Adam's sons except Seth. It passes by the
rest of them, because Abraham and Israel were to come through
Seth's line. Then the line of Seth is traced
down to Enoch and Noah, and the sons of Noah are listed, Shem,
Ham and Japheth. But Ham and Japheth are dismissed,
just the brief words mentioned, and focus is given to the family
of Shem, because from Shem we get Abraham's family. Ishmael
is excluded from Abraham's seed, and Isaac is chosen. Esau is rejected from Isaac's
seed, and Jacob is chosen. And then attention is focused
on Jacob's twelve sons, these twelve sons of Jacob through
whom the tribes of Israel were established. And then the twelve
tribes are rejected, because the purpose of God is focusing
on one thing. It's focusing on him who is to
come, the Lion of the tribe of Judah. And finally, Judah stands
alone and Levi, the kingly tribe and the priestly tribe. From
the tribe of Judah comes David and Solomon and the kings of
the house of David, right down to the time of the Babylonian
captivity. Levi's tribe is traced back to
Aaron, the first of the priests, and then the priests who were
prominent in the kingdom during David's reign. Then in chapter
10 we are given a sad piece of history. It describes for us
Saul's miserable reign. And it concludes in verses 13
and 14, telling us why God's judgment fell on Saul. This is
why God's judgment fell on Saul, and this is why God's judgment
falls on men and nations and kings and rulers to this day. Because Saul despised and rejected
the counsel of God, he refused to bow to God's throne, but rather
chose for himself, in his magnificent brilliance, to seek the counsel
of a witch. It's called idolatry. Now, folks
like to debate, did this witch really conjure up Samuel from
the dead? I could give you an answer that
ain't going to. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. The point
that matters is Saul thought she did. And Saul thought he
could get the mind of God consulting anyone but God Almighty. It was
but a piece of idolatry called witchcraft. Let us ever seek
and be guided by the counsel of God, given in his word in
all things." People say, well, I just feel this is what God,
show me what God has. Your feelings and my feelings
don't matter. Your thoughts and my thoughts
don't matter. We must be guided by the counsel
of God, given in his word. Otherwise, we are guided by the
counsel of our own lust, and we will be brought to destruction,
just as Saul was. Then, beginning in chapter 11,
the rest of the book, from chapter 29, is taken up with God's king,
God's ark, and God's worship. Chapter 11 opens with the establishment
of David as king over all Israel. As we've seen before, David,
of course, was an eminent, great type of the Lord Jesus Christ,
God's Son, whom he's exalted to be a Prince and a Savior,
to give his salvation to chosen sinners. Look at verse 1, 1 Chronicles
11. Then all Israel gathered themselves
unto David, unto Hebron, saying, Behold, we are thy bone and thy
flesh. Sooner or later, all Israel shall
be saved. All God's elect shall be saved.
Every one of them will one by one be gathered to Christ, and
they will be gathered to him as his very bone and flesh, because
we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. We are one with him. And when
it gets done, all Israel shall be completely gathered to him.
Verse 2. Moreover, in time past, even
when Saul was king, Thou wast he that led us out and brought
us in Israel, and the Lord thy God said unto thee, Thou shalt
feed my people, and thou shalt be ruler over my people Israel." Even when we refused to acknowledge
him, when we had no idea who he was, he is still king, the
king whom God set over us. to feed us, to rule us, to protect
us. And he did it all the days of
our lives. Look back upon your life's experience
and see how God, in his marvelous grace, by even the heavenly angels,
whom he has appointed to be ministering spirits, sent forth to minister
to those who should be heirs of salvation, watched over, led,
provided for, fed, and protected us from all that would harm us. from myselves, and from men,
and from hell. Marvelous is the goodness of
our God. We don't. Therefore came all the elders
of Israel to the king, to Hebron, and David made a covenant with
them in Hebron. When they came to him, David
made a covenant with them. And as we come to Christ, the
Lord God reveals his covenant with us." He made this covenant
before the Lord. And they anointed David king
over Israel according to the word of the Lord by Samuel. Now look at verse 9. So David
waxed greater and greater. I just thought of the first message
Brother Larry Crease preached from his pulpit, not a long time
ago. He wrapped his message up by
referring us to John chapter 3, verse 30. He must increase, but I must
decrease. Let Christ ever increase, and
he shall ever increase until time is no more." Now look at
chapter 13. Beginning in chapter 13, our
attention is focused on the ark of God, the temple of God, and
the worship of God. These are the things which are
constantly held before us in the book of God as matters of
paramount importance. The Ark of God, the Ark of the
Covenant, with its mercy seat, represents and is typical of
our Lord Jesus Christ and the accomplishment of atonement by
the sacrifice of Christ, by the shedding of his blood. It is
by his blood that justice is satisfied By his blood sprinkled
typically on the mercy seat, that the broken law of God is
covered, and our sins are blotted out and we are reconciled to
God. The mercy seat is a picture of
God's salvation accomplished by Christ through his blood atonement. represents the whole church of
God, the whole building of God, the whole house of God, the whole
kingdom of God. It represents the finished work
of Christ, the finished purpose of God, which is the salvation
of his elect. What's God doing in this world?
He's building his church. He's gathering the stones of
his temple. He's building his kingdom. And
when he's finished, his temple shall be filled with his glory.
His house shall be magnificent beyond imagination. This is the
purpose of God that shall at last be accomplished by Christ.
And the worship of God, the worship of God, is that which
we render to God by faith in Christ. Now, Bobby, it's not
just when we pray. It's not just when we read the
book. It's not just when we gather here three or four times a week.
It's the whole life we render to God. Now, please don't misunderstand
me. I do not in any way minimize
the need for reading the book. for private prayer, and certainly
not for public worship. You and I ought to give ourselves
to these things and arrange our lives around these things. We
ought to do it. We ought to do it. Believers
do. Believers' lives are lives of
worship. And this is what we render to
him. We bring to him all the totality of the service of our
lives for the honor of his name, for the increase of his kingdom,
for the glory of his son. They must be paramount in our
hearts. I read today about a cathedral
in Milan, Italy. You know about how much respect
I have for cathedrals. But in this cathedral there are
three doors. One in the middle, one on the
left, one on the right. Over each door is an inscription. Over the right door there is
carved a wreath of flowers and this inscription. All that pleases
is but for a moment. Over the left door the inscription
reads, All that troubles is but for a moment. But over the main
center door, this is the inscription. Nothing is important save that
which is eternal. God teach me that. God teach you that. Nothing is
important except that which is eternal. All that pleases our
nature is just for a moment. All that troubles us in this
world is just for a moment. Only that which is eternal is
of importance. Whether therefore you eat or
drink, or whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God. Whatsoever you do in word or
deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, believing him, giving
thanks unto God the Father by him. If you then be risen with
Christ, seek those things which are above, set your affection
on things above, not on things on the earth, because you're
dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. Now let's see
what this book teaches us about the worship of God. Look at chapter
13, verse 1, one of David's first acts, and it was a noble desire. One of his first acts was to
bring the ark of God to its rightful place in Zion. Verse 1, And David
consulted with the captains of all the thousands and hundreds,
and every leader. And David said to all the congregation
of Israel, It is seen good to you. What a mistake! What a mistake! It doesn't matter whether it
seems good to you or not, if it's right. If it seemed good
to you, and that it be of the Lord our God, hmm, it kind of throws that in. This is what I want to do. I
believe God will be in it. Let us send abroad unto our brethren
everywhere that are left in all the land of Israel, and with
them also to the priests and Levites which are in their cities
and suburbs, that they may gather themselves unto us. And let us
bring again the ark of our God to us, for we inquired not at
it in the days of Saul." For twenty years, for twenty long
years. The ark of God, the mercy seat,
the sacrifice, had been neglected. No one, no one had consulted
God at the mercy seat in 20 years. The sacrifice, the mercy seat,
the place where God meets with men. The Lord Jesus Christ had
been despised and neglected for twenty years. And David wanted
to reestablish the worship of God in Israel. But he made some
fatal mistakes. Mistakes which prohibit the possibility
of reestablishing the worship of God. Mistakes that will surely
bring destruction. Rather than consulting with God,
seeking the will of God, he consulted with the people and sought the
will of the people. Rather than having the ark of
God carried on the shoulders of the Levites as God required,
David made an impressive, ornate, new cart for the ark. Oh, we'll
take the ark of God, and we're going to make the finest cart
that's ever been seen in the land, and we're going to set
that ark there, and everybody's going to see the ark of God is
valued by us before anything else! God said, don't do it. God said, nobody but the Levites
are to carry this ark. Nobody else. And rather than
sacrificing, when you come to the ark, you come with a sacrifice.
When you come to the mercy seat, you come with blood. But rather
than sacrificing, they had a great, impressive show. I mean a show
that would impress anybody. It would impress anybody. And
nobody despised them because of it. They played and danced
and made music and were merry. Oh, they had a great time. Felt
so good. Felt so good. Everybody liked
it. But this is what God says about
it. They played before God with all their might. That's a pretty
good description of religion, isn't it? Any of you picked up the paper
and read what was going on around here Easter Sunday? Wait till
Christmas rolls around, it gets worse every year. They played
before God with all their might, spared no cost. Spared no energy,
spared no effort, played with all their might. Everybody was
impressed except God Almighty. He was despised in all their
playing. And then suddenly, as they're
going along playing religion, the ox cart, one of the oxen
stumbled and the ox cart tipped. And it looked like the ark of
God was about to fall on the ground. And we can't have that. We just can't have that. We can't
let that happen. And Uzzah, this fellow who's
walking by the ark, he just reaches out his hand and holds up the
ark to keep it from falling. That's a good thing. That's a
wonderful thing for a man to do. Would be except for one thing. God said, don't you put your
hand on that ark. Don't you touch it. Because you
see, that ark represents blood atonement. That ark represents
Christ and God's salvation by Christ. And God Almighty will
not allow a man to put his hand to Christ's finished work. If
you do, he'll still kill you. Immediately, God struck him dead. And when David saw that, there's
the ark of God. And there's us up there and there's
David. And the party's over. You talk about raining on a parade,
God rained on their parade. And David got mad. The scripture
tells us plainly that David was mad at God. He got mad at God. And when he was mad at Him, he
was scared to death of Him. scared the death of God's truth,
scared the death of God's ark, scared the death to approach
God in the only way in which God Almighty said sinners could
approach him. And then, when the Lord showed
his disapproval of man's devices, David called on God, and called on God to direct him. And he sought the mind of the
Lord. And he prepared a place for the ark. And he called Israel
together, and he didn't say, Now, do you all want to go fetch
the ark? He said, Boys, we're going to
go fetch the ark. There's a huge difference. He
said, We're going down to get the ark, and we're not going
to make any kind of an impressive show. We're not going to have
a new Cadillac car to put it on this time. We're not going
to make a party to impress folks, but rather we're going to do
this thing the way God said do it. And he goes and gets the
Levites. And he calls them together and
says, You carry the ark. That's what God said to them.
You carry the ark to its place, not my place. And we will worship
the Lord. Look in verse 13 of chapter 15.
As he calls them together, doing everything by the book, acknowledging
that what he had done before was altogether wrong, that his
pretense of worship was an affront to God. He says in verse 13,
because you did it not at the first." That is, you didn't do
this thing right the first time. The Lord our God made a breach
upon us, for that we sought him not after the due order. Now, learn this, children of
God. Learn it well. Let it be fixed in our hearts.
If we would worship God, if we would serve If we would engage
ourselves in the business of worshiping God, of serving the
interest of his kingdom, we must do so only in the way he has
prescribed, taking nothing from the book, neither doctrine nor
ordinance, adding nothing to the book, neither doctrine nor
ordinance. trusting Christ alone. That's all. Now if you get down
to the end of chapter 15, you'll see something a little different
this time. Verse 29, this didn't happen
back in chapter 13 when they were doing things their way.
It didn't happen back in chapter 13 when they were leaping and
dancing and having a party and playing the psaltery and playing
mightily before the Lord. This didn't happen back in chapter
13 when they made their own ox cart and set the ark of God on
it. This didn't happen when they
were pleasing the flesh, Bob. But when David leaped and danced
before the ark of God, because God chose him, because he understood
what was represented in it, because he understood that by the sacrifice
of Christ, represented in that very mercy seat which he had
so abused before, he finds redemption and forgiveness. He leaps and
dances before the ark. And Michael looked out her window,
and she saw him, and she despised him. she despised him with all
her heart." Now you can mark it down. As
we worship our God through faith in Christ alone, giving all honor
and glory to Him alone, we will be despised by those who still
want to play with all their might before God, but do not know Him. Now look at chapter 16. So they brought the ark of God
and set it in the midst of the tent that David pitched for it,
and they offered burnt sacrifices and peace offerings before God.
And when David had made an end of offering the burnt offerings
and the peace offerings, he blessed the people in the name of the
Lord, and he dealt to every one of Israel, both man and woman,
to every one a loaf of bread and a piece of flesh and a flagon
of wine. The burnt offerings and peace
offerings, of course, speak of Christ by whom we have peace
with God, by whom we have redemption, by whom we have acceptance. Once
the offerings were accepted, on the basis of the offerings
made, David comes out and blesses the people as God's team. He
blesses the people robed in white linen garments, in the garments
of humility and purity. He blesses the people on the
basis of the sacrifice with the authority of the throne on which
God had put him. And then he gave each one a loaf
of bread, a piece of flesh, and a flag and a wire. Symbols and
pictures of Christ's sacrifice, and symbols and pictures of our
communion with God by him. Now, look at chapter 17. We read here of God's promise
to David. The great desire of David's heart
was to build a house for the Lord. build a temple for the glory
of God. To build a temple where men and
women could have a fixed place at which to gather and worship
God at his altar on his mercy seat. But the Lord told David
you can't do it. He's told David by his prophet,
he sent Nathan to him, he said, that's a great thing. Do all
that's in your heart. And then he sent him back and
said, now you've got to stop right here. What you can do is you
gather all the material, you make all the preparation, you
make everything to be ready for the temple to be built. But you
can't build it. You can't build it because you
have shed much blood upon the earth. I'll tell you what I'll
do. I'll let your son Solomon build
the temple, and he'll build it right." And David bowed to God's
will. He not only bowed to God's will,
he counted it a great honor and privilege to be allowed to do
this. David represents might and power,
and David represents authority, and David represents the gathering
of everything necessary for the construction and completion of
the temple. But he can't build it. The Lord
says, no. You remember that boy Solomon? that you and her that had been
the wife of Uriah brought into this world, whom you called Solomon,
which means peace, whom I called Jedidiah, which means beloved
of the Lord, he's going to finish the work. The Lord Jesus Christ,
our Savior, while he walked on this earth, as he obeyed the
will of God in all things, and then at last gave his life over
to divine justice, for the satisfying of God's law and justice, and
finished the work." Wait a minute. It ain't finished yet. It ain't
finished. I beg to differ, it's not finished."
Well, yes it is. I couldn't differ with that.
What? How can you say that? All the
work of righteousness is finished. All the work of redemption is
finished. But the temple is still a building.
And the one who is building it is he whose name is Beloved of
the Lord, whose name is Peace. Jesus Christ our Redeemer. No
wonder we find written in the book of Luke, concerning this
one who is greater than Solomon, Thou shalt call his name Jesus.
He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest,
and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father
David." What? He never did sit on the throne
over there! What's he talking about? He's talking about what
that throne represented. He's talking about the throne
of grace, given the throne represented in David's throne. And he shall
reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there
shall be no end. Now, this is what God promised
David, and this is what he promises us. my people, not the physical nation. Now, don't misunderstand me.
Please don't let anybody get the notion that there's something
with regard to anti-Semitism in here. I'm no more anti-Semitic
than I am anti-Southern. No. That's just not it. That's
not it. But neither my being Southern
nor them being Jews have got anything at all to do with God's
promise here in this passage. What's he talking about then?
He's talking about God's Israel. God's holy nation, God's church,
God's kingdom. He's talking about something
spiritual. He says, my people shall be preserved forever. I set my bow in the sky and my
coven in the shore. He says, My people shall be preserved
forever. My nation shall never come to
an end, as long as the sun and the moon endure. And this is
a matter of certainty, because David's throne, that is the throne
of grace on which Christ, the Son of David, is set, is permanently
secured with the covenant of God surrounding it. As a faithful
witness in the sky, the rainbow declares his covenant and his
throne is sure. And David's son shall sit on
that throne in Jerusalem, which is above, the mother of us all,
forever." And that's the promise God gave to David. And then comes
the saddest event in the life of this man, David. The saddest
event. Isn't it interesting, when you
read through these 29 chapters, that no mention at all is made
of the matter of Uriah and Bathsheba. The only hint of it is where
the scripture says David stayed in the palace. That's the only
hint of it. But here, in chapter 21, there is a detailed account
of David numbering the children of Oh, and what havoc it wrought
in Israel. Because he numbered Israel, God
sent his prophet to him, and he said, now David, you got three
choices. He gave him the choice, and David
said, let me fall to the hands of God, because he's merciful.
And God sent judgment. Thousands died. How come? just because David sat in the
back pew and started counting folks up. I can't tell you how
many times I've had preachers say to me, please understand,
I try my best to never even think about the number of folks who
are here or not here. But I can tell you how many times I've
had preachers say, oh, we don't keep numbers so God might get
us like he did David. That's not what he's talking
about. That's not what he's talking about. That's not what he's talking
about. Well, what's he talking about,
Preacher? David's numbering of Israel, I'm sure, at least in
part, was a matter of pride on his part, because he looked out
and said, Man, look what a great kingdom I built. I'm sure that
part of it. But there's more to it than that.
David's numbering of Israel conveyed the thought that God's cause
and God's glory and God's kingdom And the success of God's kingdom
depends on the number of folks who support it. And Joab said,
David, this is God's kingdom. You take care of things, you'll
even number it. But David's word prevailed. He wanted to see the
number of people that were available to him, and thus the glory and
the physical strength of his realm and of his kingdom. But
you see, God Almighty never works by majority. And when we begin
to think the cause of Christ is somehow dependent upon our
numbers or our strength, we dishonor God and dishonor the power of
the gospel. The Lord God sent Gideon to deliver
his people, and he whittled down his army from 32,000 to 300.
He sent David to kill Goliath with a shepherd's sling and one
rock from the brook. He sent Samson to slay the Philistines
with a jawbone of an ass. And he still works with nothing
and nobody. But there's more than that. When
David numbered Israel, he totally disregarded the atonement
of Christ. Now you can come back and look
at it later. In Exodus chapter 30, verses 11 through 16, God
gave a law. when Israel was to be numbered
every year. He said, number them, count them
up, count them up. And he said, each man is to come
and bring atonement money, a half a shekel. That's money that any man can
get hold of. There wasn't a man in Israel
who couldn't get a half a shekel, wasn't a one. It was the same
money for all of them, the same price for all of them, and it
was for Israel alone. And every man in Israel was to
have the atonement money. Now listen to me. The numbering
of Israel spoke of atonement, but David spoke here of atonement
without price. And the price of the hash shekel
was the redeeming blood of Jesus Christ, by which Israel was redeemed,
and all who paid the ransom money were preserved from any plague
falling upon them." But when David numbered them and neglected
the atonement, God sent a plague. Oh, what a
plague. and it would have destroyed the
whole nation, except for one thing. Look in chapter 21, verse 17.
Against this dark, dark backdrop is a picture of the whole message
of this book. It's called substitution. David said unto God, Is it not
I that commanded the people to be numbered? Even I, it is, that
hath sinned, and done evil indeed. But as for these sheep, what
have they done? Let thine hand, I pray thee,
O Lord my God, be on me and on my father's house, but not on
thy people, that they should be plagued." And before that
happened, the Lord God, back up in verse 15, saw the slaughter
that was wrought angel of the Lord, with his sword drawn in
his hand. And he's going about to slaughter
all of Israel. And God says, it is enough, stay
now thine hand. How come? Because he was looking
on something. Not just the picture of David's
intercession, but he was looking upon the threshing floor of Orinon. that was found on Mount Moriah,
where Abraham offered his son Isaac, where God Almighty was
determined to offer his son, the Lord Jesus Christ.