Turn with me to 2 Samuel chapter
23. 2 Samuel chapter 23. Just hold that passage open. In the setting of this chapter,
there was a push over the land of Israel, especially through
the city of Jerusalem. was a quiet stirring in the palace
of the king. For the king was laying upon
his bed dying. It was not just any king, it
was David, the great king of Israel, that one who was both
a king and a prophet. His pulse was weak, cold sweat
was upon his forehead, his hands were clammy. David, who had been
the sweet psalmist of Israel, the sweet singer of Israel. David,
who had so often spoken for God to the people. For 40 years,
David had reigned with great prosperity in the nation of Israel. He had reigned and walked before
God in uprightness of heart. He had ruled the land with civil
righteousness and justice. and he had ruled the land with
spiritual devotion. He had set an example for the
children of Israel to follow in all matters of the worship
of God. He had appointed the building of the temple and he
had set the instruments of music in the temple and he had given
the songs of the temple to be sung and appointed the men who
would sing those songs. David, the great king, was about
to fall and everyone was anxious to hear a word from David. I
can imagine their anxiety. David had spoken to them for
God. God had spoken to their hearts
through David. And they must have wondered what
will become of us when David's gone. Will we ever hear from
God again? What will his last word be? And
so in the palace, in the halls of the palace, in the streets
of Jerusalem, everyone was anxious, uneasy. waiting to see if they
could get one word from the king. And we have here in verse one
of chapter 23, the last words of David. Now these be the last
words of David. David, but not just any David,
David, the son of Jesse. David, the man after God's own
heart. These are the last words of David,
the king. the prophet of Israel. What will
he say? Well, the first thing he does
is he describes himself. David, the son of Jesse, just
a common, ordinary shepherd boy. On his last day, David remembered
well the beginning day. David remembered the pit from
which he had been digged and the rock from which he had been
hewn. He was just a common, ordinary
shepherd boy. One day, David's father came
to him. I can picture it. He was sitting
out, maybe on a rock somewhere, playing his harp, picking at
his harp. And his father came to him, and
he said, he said, David, now I want to talk to you about something.
He put his arms around his shoulders. He said, the prophet Samuel's
coming to our house today, and he's looking for a king. one
to anoint who will sit upon the throne of Israel. And he's going
to pick a king out of one of my eight sons. I'm greatly honored
of God. But David, you're the youngest
of the boys and somebody has to take care of the sheep. So
if you don't mind today while the prophet's here, if you'll
get up early this morning and take the sheep out and take care
of them while the prophet is tending to things, because you're
the youngest, he's not going to pick you. You would be the
last one on the totem pole. If you don't mind, take the sheep
out and then one day I'll do something special for you too.
So David took the sheep out and the prophet came. And he called
for Jesse to call his sons in and he called the oldest. God
said, that's not the man. And he called the next one. God
said, that's not the man. Finally, he called all of David's
seven brothers into the house and God passed by them all. And
Samuel said, don't you have any other sons? And Jesse said, well,
yeah, I've got one, but he's just a young lad. He's a shepherd
boy. He's smaller than all the rest
of these boys. And I don't see why you'd want
to see him. Samuel said, go get him. We'll
not eat until David is brought to the house. And so David was
brought in. He walked in. I imagine he was
astonished to see the old prophet of God. This young boy just come
in from tending the sheep. And the Spirit of the Lord said,
this is he, arise and anoint him. And all of his brothers
stood by with the faces. David, that young boy, was anointed
to be king. He says, David, the son of Jesse,
the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the God
of Jacob, have whose word must have sounded precious thoughts
into this man's ears as he lay dying. He was the man that God
had raised up from tending the sheep, anointed him with the
holy oil, and set him upon the throne of Israel, the man out
of whose loins the Messiah would come, the man out of whose loins
the Redeemer would come. David, the son of Jesse, how
God had lifted him up as it were from the dunghill to sit among
princes, even as he has done for all his own. Well, this boy,
Jesse, awaited the time when he should sit upon the throne.
After a while, you will remember that, I don't know what on earth
that is, not mine. After a while, you'll remember
that David was still at home, tending his father's sheep, and
the children of Israel were out in battle array. There was a
giant, a giant in the land, a giant called Goliath, and he mocked
the God of Israel. He mocked the servants of the
Most High God. And his father sent David to
go out and take some food to his brothers and see how they
were getting along. And so David came. And when he
came, he heard this giant blaspheming God. And David said to his brother,
he said, who is this man? What's he doing? And his brothers
looked at him and they said, well, you smart aleck little
whippersnapper, you've just come up here to see how the battle's
going. You've just come up here to smart
off with us. What's this got to do with you?
David said, I'll tell you what it's got to do with me. I'm going
to go out and slay that giant in the name of God. And his brothers
looked at him and said, you can't do anything. What do you mean
you're going out there after this? He said, is there not a
cause? The glory of God. And cost what
it may, that giant's gonna fall. Cost what it may. And so he went
out. They tried to put Saul's armor
on him. They sent him out after that Philistine in the armor
of a man twice his size. And David said, I can't do anything
with this. I'll go out in the name of the living God. And he
took the stone in his hand and the giant fell. And there stands
David with that giant sword in his hand, cutting off the giant's
head. He had slain the Philistine and
all of Israel spoke of David's acclaim and his fame. After a
while, God took Saul off the throne and he set David in his
place. Now in this passage, David describes
himself then as the son of Jesse, the humble common shepherd boy,
but the man upon whom the hand of God rests. The man who was
raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the
sweet psalmist of Israel. That's a good name for David.
I have found in visiting with people over the years, especially
as God's saints get older, of all the pages in their Bibles,
I'll pick up the scriptures and read a verse to them or a chapter,
of all the pages in their Bibles, The Psalms of David are the most
solemn. For those Psalms of David speak
forth the sweetness of covenant mercy. They speak forth the sweetness
of redeeming love. They give the continual conflicts
of David's heart and soul as he goes into his closet before
God and David poured out his heart to the Lord and he pinned
it down in Psalms, in hymns to be sung in the church by the
ancient choirs of Israel. The sweet psalmist of Israel.
Oh, what sweeter than the Psalms of God's servant, David. We just
sang four or five good hymns, precious hymns. I appreciate
Lindsey picking out good hymns, but he can't pick out any like
these. These are the best. These are the Psalms inspired
of God to give consolation, hope, and encouragement to his children.
So David describes himself, and then he describes his Psalms
and his prophecies. Look at verse two. The spirit
of the Lord spake by me and his word was in my tongue. The God
of Israel said, the rock of Israel spake unto me. Now it's no accident
that in these two verses, David mentions all three persons of
the Holy Trinity. the Spirit of the Lord, the God
of Israel, and the Rock of Israel, the Lord Jesus Christ. David
claimed for himself inspiration, for he said, the Spirit of the
Lord spake by me. The Spirit of God spoke in my
heart and through my mouth. His word is in my tongue. I quickly wrote down that which
God inspired me to write. David describes his psalms as
being prophecies. He describes them as being words
of inspiration. So when you read the Psalms of
David, you're reading the very Word of God as we are reading
here. And those Psalms that spoke of the coming of Christ, the
sufferings of Christ and the glory of Christ, those Psalms
that spoke of forgiveness and pardon and justification and
peace with God, they were inspired of God. The Spirit of the Lord
moved upon David and he spoke the very Word of God. And then
David describes his rule as king. In verse three, the God of Israel
said, the rock of Israel spake to me. He that ruleth over men
must be just, ruling in the fear of God. And he shall be as the
light of the morning when the sun rises, even a morning without
clouds, as the tender grass springing out of the earth by the clear
shining after the rain. Now read the passage in the present
tense. If you just go through and leave out the words in italics,
this is how it would read. He that rules over men is just,
ruling in the fear of God. And he is as the light of the
morning when the sun rises, even a morning without clouds, as
the tender grass springing out of the earth by the clear shining
after the rain. Do you see what David's saying?
David is giving his last word, and this is what he's saying.
He's saying, God wanted me to be king. And while I am a frail,
fickle, sinful man, yet I fought a good fight. I finished my course. I've kept the faith. I've ruled
as God told me to rule. I've ruled with righteousness
and with justice. I rule with uprightness and integrity. And my rule over men has been
in the fear of God. And as a result of that, then
my rule has been as the light of the morning, as the sun shining. It is even as a morning without
clouds, as the tender grass springing up out of the earth. It has brought
forth great abundance to the people under my rule. But this
is also a prophecy. It is a prophecy of David's greater
son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He says again, concerning the
Lord Jesus Christ, he that ruleth over men must be just. The one who is coming after me,
he is the just ruler. Ruling in the fear of God, I
have done so comparatively. I have done so as a feeble, fickle,
frail man, but not perfectly. But there is one coming after
me who shall sit upon the throne and rule over all men in justice. He will rule over all men in
the fear of God with reverence for God. Perfect, absolute reverence. And he shall be as the light
of the morning. for he is the light of the world.
He shall be as the sun rising, for he is the son of righteousness
who arises with healings in his wings. He shall be as a morning
without clouds, for he has dissipated the clouds of darkness and brought
all things to light. And as the tender grass springing
out of the earth, as it springs up a great multitude, so his
people shall spring up out of the earth a great multitude as
the clear shining after the rain. So he describes himself and he
describes his Psalms and his prophecies. He describes his
rule and he declares the coming of Christ, the great king. And
then in this fifth verse, David declares his dying hope. Here
is a man of God, a man who's walked before God in righteousness,
a man who has lived before men with innocence. You say, well,
David had many things laid against him. We'll talk about those in
a minute. But the tenor of his life, the trend, the characteristic
of this man was innocence. Saul charged him with many evils,
but when David went before God, he said, I'm not guilty of what
Saul said. Ahithophel accused him of many crimes, but when
David knelt before God in secret before God Almighty, David said,
Lord, you know my heart. You know I'm innocent in this
matter. Now, David is a righteous man, a man who is upright before
God, a man who rules with sincerity of heart. Oh, that we had kings
like David today. We cherish democracy. We cherish
the freedom that democracy gives. Oh, if God would in his providence
give us a king like David, it'd be well to be ruled by a monarch.
David was a rare king, rare among men, the great king of Israel.
But as he speaks of his hope, as he comes to speak his last
word, he is saying something for himself, yes. And he's saying
something for the generation that's standing around. I can
imagine that as David spoke his last words, his thoughts were
toward his family, his wife, his friends, his companions.
His thoughts were fixed toward the children of Israel whom he
had led for 40 years. His thoughts were especially
fixed upon those vagrant men who had followed him in good
times and in bad. And David, as he spoke concerning
his hope, was looking to this generation as well, and to all
future generations, for he was speaking by the Spirit of God.
Now look at the things that David said. First of all, as he lay
on his deathbed, looking within himself and around himself. Looking
upon his family and his friends, David remembered many things
which caused him sorrow. And we see David sigh here in
these first verses. Although my house, be not so
with God. Oh, what sorrow this man had.
David's heart was heavy as he lay dying because many in his
household neither knew nor worshiped his God. Many in his household
had no fear of God. Many in his household had no
regard for the coming Christ. Many in his household had no
interest in the grace of God and in his covenant mercy. Let
me show you a few passages. Turn back to chapter seven and
verse 20. David was bringing the ark of
God up out of the house of Obed-Edom. And the Has he brought the ark
of God up? Well, look in chapter six, rather
in verse 20. He returned to bless his household. I can picture
him. He'd been worshiping God. He'd
been bringing the ark up. And he came home to bless his
house. He came home to tell his house all that God had taught
him. Let me tell you, honey, how that God worked wonders in
our midst today. Let me tell you what God has
done while I've been away. And he came to speak blessing
to his house, as he did Michael, the daughter of Saul. This is
his wife. She came out to meet David and she said, how glorious
was the king of Israel today. You see, David had come before
the ark of God. He saw in that wooden coffin
a picture of Christ. He saw Christ, the Redeemer.
He saw the atonement, the mercy seat, the putting away of sin.
He leaped and danced before the ark. She said, you uncovered
yourself in the eyes of the handmaids of your servants, as one of the
vain fellows shamelessly uncovereth himself. And David said, you
wretched woman, You sorry, peaceable woman. It was before the Lord
which chose me before thy father, and before all his house, to
appoint me ruler over the people of the Lord. Over Israel, therefore,
will I play before the Lord. And I will yet be more vile than
thus, and will yet will be base in mine own sight, and of the
handmaidens which thou hast spoken of, of them shall I be had in
honor. Therefore Michael the daughter
of Saul had no child into the day of her death. God had cursed
her and because she had despised God, despised the covenant, despised
the blessings, she had no regard for his God. But David loved
that woman. She was the first love of his
heart. She was the one whom he loved
before all others. She was the one who was his first
wife and his first companion. But Michael had no regard for
God. I'm sure as David lay on his bed, he must have remembered
his sons and his daughter, Tamar, his beloved daughter. She was
a beautiful woman, and she had a wicked, godless brother named
Amnon. And Amnon wanted Tamar for his
wife, an incestuous marriage, and Tamar wouldn't have it. So
one day Amnon played sick, and he told his father that he needed
Tamar to come and minister to him and to comfort him. And so
she came, and Amnon took her and forced her and raped her.
Two years passed, nothing happened. Not a word was spoken. Amnon
went on his way. But Tamar's brother Absalom made
a plan, a plot and a scheme. He would set a time at the shearing
of the sheep for a party. And when Amnon was drunk and
his heart was merry with wine, Absalom put out a contract on
his brother. He said, now, fellas, when he's
drunk, kill it, kill it. He raped my son. So one of David's friends came
to him and he said, your son, Amnon is dead. Who did this thing? Your son Absalom did this thing.
You think you've got troubles? Huh? You think you've got difficulties? David knew what trouble was.
He said, your son Absalom has killed him. Now Absalom's crime
was somewhat justified because of Amnon's sin. But David the
king must rule in righteousness. And so he must exercise judgment
upon his own flesh and blood. And he said, Absalom, pack your
bags and don't come home for three years. Get out of the kingdom. Get out of the kingdom. And he
expelled him. Well, Absalom came back. And
when he came back, he came back plotting and scheming. He came
back and he lied against his father. The father who loved
him. The father who delighted in him.
the father who probably would have given him the throne of
Israel. Absalom came back with rebellion in his heart and through
his cunning and conniving, he stole the hearts of Israel from
David. He plotted for David's overthrow
and one day Joab came in and he said, David, we got to get
out of town. We've got to leave the throne
and we've got to leave the palace. There's an insurrection brewing
and he's got too many men. We can't fight him off. We'd
lose if we went to battle with him. David said, well, Joab,
who is the man? David, I don't have to tell you this,
but it's your son Absalom. And David left Jerusalem. Shamefully. You can imagine how
it's been. You can just imagine. It's one
thing for a son or a daughter to shamelessly reproach father
or mother. It's one thing for someone like
President Reagan's daughter to produce a book exposing inward
weaknesses of the family and inward traits of the father and
the mother. It's one thing to do that. But
Absalom has succeeded in totally ruining his father's reputation.
He succeeded in totally turning the hearts of the people against
And David, with shame, goes out again across the brook. When
he did, Absalom, his son, took his wives, his concubines, and
publicly raped them before all Israel. I'll show you what kind of regard
I have for this man. Here are his wives. As he went along, Shemai came
out, the son of Saul, and he cursed David. I mean, he gave
him a cussing. He said, David, you're the son
of a wicked woman. You're a wicked man and the judgment
of God's on you. Now you're getting what you deserve.
David passed on. Absalom had revolted against
him. Oh, how David's heart ached as he lay on his bed and he realized
that grace does not run in the bloodline, but only corruption. Mercy does not run in the bloodline,
but only sin. Righteousness does not run in
the bloodline, but only rebellion. David's house, as he thought
about it, was not what he wanted it to be. It was not what God
required it to be. And as he looked out into the
future of his descendants, he realized that in all likelihood,
His house would never be as he desired, for his sons were not
such as he would desire. David's house caused him great
difficulty, great pain, although my house be not so with God.
And I am sure that David, being the honest man he was, his heart
was also made to sigh because of his remembrance of his own
sins. After all, after all, much of
what he reaped in his family, he had sown in his family. Much
of the difficulty that he felt in his heart with his sons and
with his household, much of the pain that now came upon him was
the result of the way he had behaved before his own family.
His vengeance, was something that had once nearly cost him
a great deal. You'll recall that David and
his men had been guarding the vineyard of Nabal. They'd been
protecting Nabal from all the folks who would do him harm and
steal his vineyard and steal his cattle. And David and his
men got hungry. They were in exile and they got
hungry. So David, excuse me, David said
to them, Fellas, we've been guarding Nabal's vineyard for two years.
Why don't you go down there and knock on old brother Nabal's
door and tell him, say, now we've been guarding your vineyard for
two years and we need some help right now. How about giving us
a calf or a lamb and give us some food to take care of us
during this time of difficulty? And Nabal looked at him and said,
well, you smart aleck. We'll teach you a lesson. You
need to be taught who you are. You go back and tell David he's
a rebel. He's a wanted man. He's an enemy
against the king. They came back and told David
what Nabal had said. He said, fellas, don't even get
off your camels. Keep your swords in your hand. We're going back
and we're going to kill every male in Nabal's house. We're
going to kill them all. The smallest boy from two years
old upward, we're going to kill them all. There's not going to
be one man left in Nabal's family when I get done. You see, this
man, he could get riled up. You know what that's like, don't
you? He could get riled up, angry, and be vengeful. But God providentially
sent Nabal's wife out. Nabal was a godless man and she
knew it, but she was a godly woman. She met David in the way,
and she brought great offerings to him. And she said, now, David,
the thing you're about to do is wrong. God's not in this.
That was a rare woman. She said, David, God will take
care of Nabal. Don't become as this man of Belial,
this ungodly wretch that I'm married to. David looked at her,
and he said, one of these days, woman, you're going to be mine.
I want a woman like that to live with. And so he got her. And
Abigail was a great companion to David. But then there was
another time when David got to being fearful. It's amazing how
men can change from one thing to another. Sometimes bold as
a lion, full of vengeance. And another time, weak-kneed
cowards. And David experienced that. He
had run from Saul and run from Saul and run from Saul until
finally he said, there's just a step between me and death.
One of these days, Saul's going to catch me. One of these days,
Saul's going to find me and that'll be the end. So he went down among
the kings, the children of Gath, and he stood before Achish the
king. And when Achish came along, in order to save his hide, David
let his spittle run down on his beard. let his hair get all messed
up, and it was dirty, and he was filthy, and he acted like
a mad dog, and he scrambled on the walls, he scratched the walls
and the doors of the palace, and Achish looked at him and
said, what have you brought this dog to me for? Why do I care if we're
a mad man? And in doing so, in changing
his behavior, his cowardice, his cowardice, caused David pain
from then on. And then one day after he was
set in the palace, David got tired of doing battle.
He got tired of going out to war. So he sent his soldiers
out to fight his battles for it. And he was sitting there
looking over his feet. As he walked on the palace porch,
he looked around. Who is that? Man, I never saw a woman like
that in my life. Well, that's Bathsheba, David. She's the wife
of your faithful servant, Uriah. David said, why don't you send
her a note that I'd like to have dinner with her tonight. And
you know the story. He took Bathsheba. Bathsheba
became pregnant with child. To cover his sin, David sent
a letter to Joab and he said, Joab, won't you take Uriah the
Hittite and find the hottest place of
battle? And now David put out a contract. Joab took the soldiers and he
put Uriah right in front and they rushed the wall. And as
they did, their enemies shot arrows down at them. And many
men died that day. Joab knew David would be upset
because there was such a slaughter in Israel, but he sent a messenger
back and he said, now when you give report to the king, be sure
to tell him Uriah's dead. It'll be okay. You know, somehow I don't imagine
David forgot it. Do you? Just don't imagine you've
forgotten. Pastor, don't you believe that
God forgives? Oh, I do. You know I do. I rejoice that
God forgives. But a godly man has much difficulty
forgiving himself. Godly man can't forget what he's
done. These are not the kind of things
you just sweep under the rug. These are not the kind of things
you just forget about. And then turn over to chapter
19 of 2 Samuel. Let me show you this. Oh, Joab takes the shellacking
a lot of times, but I'm going to tell you, Joab was a rare
fellow too. When Absalom had been defeated
and killed, David mourned for his son Absalom. Look at this
in verse 33 of chapter 18. This is one of the most pitiful
verses you'll ever read. And the king was much moved and
went up to the chamber over the gate and wept. And as he went,
thus he said, Oh, my son, Absalom, my son, my son, Absalom, would
God I had died for thee. Oh, Absalom, my son, my son. But that wasn't sufficient. David
went right on with his mourning. And when the armies of Israel
had come back and men had sacrificed their lives for David, to protect
David, to uphold David, to put David on his throne, David continued
to mourn and to lament. So much so that the people were
ready to revolt and take David off the throne themselves. And
in verse 5 of chapter 19, Joab came to the house of the king.
And he said, Thou hast shamed this day the faces of all thy
servants, which this day have saved thy life, and the lives
of thy sons, and of thy daughters, and the lives of thy wives, and
the lives of thy concubines, in that thou lovest thine enemies
and hatest thy friends. For thou hast declared this day
that thou regardest neither princes nor servants. For this day I
perceive that if Absalom had lived, and all we had died this
day, then it had pleased thee well." Whoo, what a review. Here's
David the king, and he has the power, the right, the authority
as king to take Joab's head off, and Joab knew it better than
anybody. But Joab says to himself, the
kingdom's at stake, the welfare of the king's at stake, and the
welfare of the people's at stake. I've got to snap David out of
this thing. So he said, David, if we had
all died in battle and Absalom had lived, you'd have been happy.
But now Absalom is dead and your enemies are dead, and though
many have died for you, you're mourning for Absalom. What kind
of shameful behavior is this? Now therefore arise, go forth
and speak comfortably unto thy servants. He said, I'm swearing
to you right now, by the name of God, if thou go not forth,
there will not tarry one with thee this night, and that will
be worse unto thee than all the evil that befell thee from thy
youth until now. And so David arose and he went
forth to greet the people. David committed another terrible
sin. It's recorded in chapter 24. He had fallen prey to the lust
of the flesh and to the lust of the eye, and now he falls
prey to the pride of life. He got to thinking about his
kingdom. Boy, I tell you what, God's done some great things
by me. God has made me the greatest
king that's ever lived on the top side of the earth. And God's
given me the greatest kingdom any man's ever had. Tell you
what, Joab, come here. I want you to go out and count
up the heads of all the people that we have in this kingdom.
Joab said, David, that's not right. That's not right. God will take care of that. God
knows who his people are. God knows where they are. What
do you want to know the number for? David said, you go out and
count the hay. And so Joab went out and he began
to count. But the spirit of the Lord sent
a prophet and David was rebuked and he repented. The prophet
said to David, said, well, you can have three years of famine
or you can have three months of falling before your enemies,
or you can have three days of pestilence. David said, God's
a God of mercy. I'll take my place under the
hand of God, send me three days of pestilence. And because of
the sin, 70,000, 70,000 died. No wonder David said, although
my house be not so with God. Pastor Wyvie said all of that
to say one thing. David had no hope in himself. No hope. Folks brag about salvation
by works if they want to. An honest man knows better. David
lay on his bed and he said, I, my health! Look what a mess. Look what a mess. He had no hope in himself, no
hope in his good works, no basis of comfort from anything he had
done, no basis of comfort from anybody around him, neither his
friends, nor his wives, nor his sons, nor his daughters, nor
his own head could give him any peace. Now look at this next
one. David sighed, was this, although
my house be not so with God, here's his solace. Yet he, God,
the everlasting God, he hath made with me an everlasting covenant,
ordered in all things and should. Oh, what a word. David said,
Joab, Bathsheba Solomon Go out and tell Israel That I
have no peace and no comfort and no hope Because of what I
am or anything I've ever done But I have great peace because
God made a covenant God made a covenant He made a covenant
with me. Made a covenant. Now David knew
something about covenant. You remember his friend Jonathan's
son? David made a covenant with Jonathan.
Jonathan and David loved one another. The scripture says the
love that David had for Jonathan was greater than the love of
a man for a woman. He loved Jonathan as his own
self. And Jonathan knew that David was going to be king in
Israel. And therefore, Jonathan knew
he was going to die. He knew he was going to be slain
because David could not be king if Jonathan lived. He was the
rightful heir to the throne. So Jonathan said to David one
day when they're out in the field, he said, David, I want you to
swear and make a covenant with me. I want you to promise me
right now that when I'm dead and gone and you're sitting on
the throne of Israel, that you'll have mercy upon my son. He didn't
even know he was going to have a son yet. He wasn't even married
yet. David said, Jonathan, when God
puts me on the throne, I'll be merciful to your house. And they
shook hands. And so when David was seated
on the throne, and Jonathan was dead, and Saul was dead, and
all the house of Saul had been destroyed, David said, is there
one left of the house of Saul that I may have mercy on him? Zyber, that was his name, wasn't
it? Zyber said, well, I tell you, David, there's a, there's
a fella named the Fiddleshell. He's the son of Jonathan. David said, well, tell me about
him. Where is he? What's he like? Zyber said, well, he's lame through
the fall. When his nurse got word that
you were taking over, she picked him up and ran in haste, and
she fell down and crushed his legs, and he's been lame ever
since. He's down in the house of no bread. He's down in Lodivar. David said, fetch him. That's
what he said. He said, fetch him. Let me tell
you this. God made a covenant. God made
a covenant. And every son in that covenant,
every child in that covenant, sooner or later, God's going
to say, fetch him, James. And they're coming. He'll send
forth his spirit and fetch them to the father's house. Well,
Mephibosheth came. He's there before the king on
his crutches or in his chair. And he said, what is thy servant
for the dead, dog, that you should want to have anything to do with
him? And David looked on that dirty, crippled, helpless, depraved
son of Jonathan. And when he saw him, I can picture. He looked at him. Oh, I'm telling
you, Jonathan, you look so good. Jonathan is good to see. You
see, when he looked on Mephibosheth, he didn't see anything but Jonathan. He didn't see anything but Jonathan.
And he set Mephibosheth at his table and he covered his crippled
legs and he made him to be as a son in his own house because
of Jonathan. Not because of Mephibosheth.
Not because of anything in Mephibosheth. Not because of anything Mephibosheth
had done. But because he made a covenant
with Jonathan before Mephibosheth was born. And he was determined
to keep his covenant. He was honor bound to keep his
covenant. Now David knew something about
a covenant. He said, now I've made a covenant
with Jonathan. And I've honored the covenant
because I'm an honorable man. But listen to me. God in heaven
has made a covenant ordered in all things and sure. Let me tell
you about the covenant. He says it's an everlasting covenant.
It's a covenant that's everlasting. It goes both ways from eternity
to eternity. It's an immutable covenant. God
made it before the world was. He made it with me. But you see,
it wasn't really with me. It was with my representative.
He made a covenant with me and the person of His Son. He made
a covenant of pure, free, sovereign grace with me. He promised to
forgive all my sins. He promised to write His law
upon my heart. He promised to keep me as He
is forever and ever. That gives me confidence. That
gives me hope. That brings peace to my heart.
This covenant's not only an everlasting covenant, it's ordained. It's
ordained. I like that word. That simply
means that God required certain things in the covenant, but everything
that was required in the covenant was promised in the covenant.
Now that's a good covenant. God demands righteousness. He
said, I'll give righteousness. God demands satisfaction. He
said, I'll give God demands a new heart. He said,
I'll give you a new heart. God demands perseverance. He
said, I'll keep you and not let you go. God demands that we hold
to him. He said, I won't let you do anything
but hold to me. Everything he required, he gave
in the covenant. It's ordered in all things and
it's sure. It's sure because God decreed
it. It's sure because Christ fulfilled it. It's sure because
Christ sits on the throne today to make certain that it's carried
out. All the blessings of the covenant are sure to all the
elect seed. And the blessings of the covenant,
those sure mercies of David are promised to every sinner who
believes on Christ. Look here and let me just read
it to you. I'm already there. Isaiah 55 verse 3. Our Lord says, incline your ear
and come unto me. Here and your soul shall live. and I will make an everlasting
covenant with you." Can you imagine that? He says, you hear and come
to me. And every sinner that hears and
comes to me, I'll make a covenant with you. Look at how he describes
it. Even the sure mercies of David. I'll give you everything I promised
to David's great son the Lord Jesus Christ before the world
was made. David says, this is my solace,
yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things
and sure. Now then, look at this. David
says, this is my desire and this is my salvation. For this is
all my salvation. all my salvation. David, what do you mean? What do you mean? Do you mean
to tell me that you based your entire hope of salvation on something
done outside of yourself before the world was made between God
the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit? You understand
what he means. That's exactly what he said. He said, I rest my soul upon
the covenant. This is my salvation. I trust
nothing else. What David's saying is this.
Your salvation and mine depend on that covenant. Depend on that
covenant. I hear folks say things that
disturb me sometimes. Your fellows say, well, you're
going to have to do this, you're going to have to do that, you'll
never be saved, Calvinism or no Calvinism, predestination
or no predestination. I got news for you. I got news
for you. God's elect are going to be saved,
Arminianism or no Arminianism, freewillism or no freewillism.
God's going to save his country. And God's people rest their souls. not upon what they are or what
they do, but upon what God in eternal covenant mercy has done
for them. That's where it is. That's where
it is. I've given it to you so many times, I hope you don't
weary of it, but I don't think I could possibly state it better
than Dr. Gill did when he was about to
die. He was just like David. He was laying on his deathbed
and just before he died, he wrote this letter to his nephew. He said in the letter, I depend
wholly and alone upon the free, sovereign, eternal, unchangeable
love of God, the firm and everlasting covenant of grace, and my interest
in the persons of the sacred trinity for my whole salvation,
and not upon any righteousness of my own, nor upon anything
in me or done by me, even under the influence of the Holy Spirit.
Not upon any services of mine which I have been assisted to
perform for the good of the Church do I depend, but upon my interest
in the persons of the Trinity, the free grace of God, and the
blessings of grace streaming to me through the blood and righteousness
of Christ as the ground of my hope. These are no new things
to me, but what I have been long acquainted with, what I can live,
and what I can die by. He wrote further, I apprehend
that I shall not be long here, but this you may tell to any
of my friends. I've lived by the covenant, I'll
die by the covenant. And then to one of his friends
who was standing close by, he said, I have nothing to make
me uneasy. That's the way to die, Bob. I
have nothing to make me uneasy. Then he quoted one verse of a
hymn written by Isaac Watts. He raised me from the deeps of
sin, the gates of gaping hell, and fixed my standing more secure
than it was before I fell. David said, this is all my salvation. And then he spoke of his satisfaction.
Not only is this all my salvation and all my solace, This is all
my satisfaction. This is all my desire. This is
all my desire. He said, let me have an interest
in the covenant and know that the promises of the covenant
are mine through the merits of Christ and I have enough. I desire no more. Now let me
tell you something. This what I live by. This is what I've lived by for
getting real close to 20 years and God gives me a grace of what
I'm going to die by. Not upon anything I've done,
not upon anything I've felt, not upon anything I've experienced,
not upon even anything that God has enabled me to do standing
in this pulpit or sitting at that desk, but I depend wholly
and alone upon the firm, free, everlasting covenant of grace,
ratified and made sure and sealed in my heart by Jesus Christ. I rest on that alone, on that
alone. I don't want anything else. For
you see, to be an heir of covenant mercy, to be an heir of covenant
grace, means that I'm redeemed. That's what the covenant's all
about. It's covenant of redemption. It means that I'm forgiven. God
promised in the covenant. Their sins and iniquities I will
remember no more. It means that I'm justified before
God. He's made me righteous in his
sight. To be an heir of the covenant means that I'm born again. God's
given me a new heart in Christ. To be an heir of the covenant
means that I'm sanctified, holy in the sight of God. To be an
heir of the covenant means that I'm an heir of God. and a joint
heir with Jesus Christ. Anything else you want? Is there
anything else of importance? Is there anything else that will
do you any good? Although my house be not so with
God, I leave it in his name. I leave
it in his name. hath made with me an everlasting
covenant, ordered in all things and sure. For this is all my
salvation and all my desire, although he make it not to grow."
What David's saying is this. Even if God never causes my family,
my household, my kingdom to grow, Even if God never causes my desire
for my own sons and daughters, even if God never causes my desire
for my own kinsmen, my own wife, and my own companions, even if
God never adds one blessing of grace to any of my blood kin,
yet He made for me a covenant that sure lasts. And I trust
Him. I trust Him. That covenant has it all, has
it all. And my friend, this gospel of
the covenant reveals everything you need, everything you need. Heard a story last week, illustrates
what I'm saying, back during the depression. There was a fellow
who was on his last leg up in New York City. middle of the
winter, had no food, and he had no money, and he had no place
to stay. He snuggled up in the middle of
the night in a little cubicle in a storefront, wrapped his
coat up around him, tried his best to stay as warm as he could.
While he was sitting there, a piece of scrap paper blew by, and he
grabbed it. He opened it up, read an advertisement. The gospel of Christ has everything
you need. Gave an address. He said, sir, I picked up this
ad right here, said the gospel of Christ has all I need. Had
your address, is that right? The man said, yeah, that's right,
son, come on in. He brought this fellow in and
the fellow looked at him, he said, tell me something about
this gospel of Christ. The man said, well, you look
like you could use a bath. So he took him upstairs, drew
warm bath water for him, Thought I looked at that. He got undressed
and he sunk down in that tub. He said, boy, this gospel of
Christ, it must be something else to take a poor old dirty
fellow like I am and give him back like this. Man came in and
took his dirty clothes out, threw them away, and put it down in
new suit of clothes. He put his suit on. He said, boy, this gospel
of Christ must be something else. Take a poor old wretch like I
am and dress him up like this. Fella came downstairs and that
fella had spread a table. I mean a banquet table. He said,
son, you look like you haven't had a good meal in a long time.
Why don't you sit down here and just feast away? Fella said,
tell me about this gospel of Christ. Fella said, well, just
go ahead and eat and enjoy yourself. And so he sat down and while
he was eating, he thought to himself, boy, this gospel of
Christ got to be something else. man like I am and provide him
with all of this manliness." The fellow got up from the table
and he said, I sure would be grateful if you'd tell me now
about this gospel that you've been talking about. And the fellow
said, well, I'll tell you, why don't you just wait until in
the morning and we'll talk about it. He said, I believe it'd do
you good to get a good night's sleep. So he took him upstairs
and he pulled back the covers and that fellow crawled into
one Feather-tipped bed, like your mother's, and it's wrapped
up around him before it covers up. Just covers himself completely
up. All you can see, just his nose
and his eyes. He's thinking to himself, man,
oh man, this gospel of Christ must be something. Take a man
who's been sleeping on the hard rocks of the street. Give him
a bath. Clothes. Bountiful food. Do you get the picture, huh?
This gospel of Christ has everything your soul needs. This covenant
does. And that will give you something
to live by and something to die by. Amen.