tonight to 1st Samuel chapter
29. As I read through this chapter several
times in the last couple of weeks, what has especially Impressed
me is seeing how that goodness and mercy of our Heavenly Father
follows God's children. That's what I'm impressed with
and that's what I trust the Lord will enable us to see and take
with us tonight. You know the Lord Jesus, he impressed
upon his disciples God's watch care. our Heavenly Father's watch
care over his children. In one place he said, are not
five sparrows sold for two farthings? And a farthing was the least
valuable piece of their money, a farthing. Are not five sparrows
sold for two farthings? And not one of them is forgotten
before God. Isn't that amazing? Not one sparrow
is forgotten before God. And some believe that it means
that every time they take a grain of weed or a grain of food, that
the father is aware of that and he feeds the birds of the air. I remember when we lived in Medina,
Yucatan, down on the square where the big cathedral was and several
old houses that were built back in, I think, the 1600s lined
the square. But there were a lot of men who
shined shoes. That's one way they earned a
living, by shining shoes. And there was one of those men,
I saw this happen more than once, about 5, 5.30 in the afternoon,
He would take out a sack of, I guess it was corn that he had
bought, and just throw that up in the air. And those birds,
there were so many birds that just accumulated. And I thought
to myself, the man certainly wasn't a wealthy man, earning
his living by shining shoes. I think they charged about a
peso back then. That would have been $0.08. And
yet, God put it into his heart to
feed those birds. How God takes care of the birds
of the air. And our Lord went on to say,
you are of much more value than a bird. How the Lord takes care
and watches over his children. And then he also said, even the
very hairs of your head are all numbered. That is truly amazing,
isn't it? The very hairs of your head are
all numbered. But our God is infinite in knowledge,
infinite in every attribute, every characteristic, isn't he?
And what would be impossible for you and I or any man to number
the hairs on the head of every person or just a few people,
it's not a problem for God. And I say, as I read through
this chapter, I was especially impressed with how that goodness
and mercy followed David. And the same thing is true of
you. Same thing is true of me and all of God's children. God's
goodness and mercy follows us as we go through this world.
Now three weeks ago we studied from chapter 27 and we saw that
David left the place where God had directed him in the tribe
of Judah and their inheritance. He had left that place because
of fear and because of unbelief. He left the place where God had
directed him and he goes among the Philistines seeking for refuge. Now we know the Philistines were
the arch enemies of Israel. As we have gone through this
book of 1 Samuel, I suppose from about chapter four on to here,
we've seen wars and trouble with the Philistines and the nation
of Israel over and over again. They were the arch enemies of
Israel at this particular time in their history. But David went
among them, went among the enemies of God's people, seeking refuge. And once there, we saw how that
he endeared himself to the king of Gath. There were five capital
cities, I guess, among the Philistines, five lords, and Gath was one
of them. That's where Goliath was from.
And David had gone there once before, this time, And he's back
there again, and he endeared himself to the king of Gath,
Achis is his name, by deceit. And if David didn't lie, he certainly
came close to it. He said things in such a way
that would lead and did lead this king to believe Yes, he's
living in my territory, in my realm, but he's going down into
the southern part of Judah, and he is fighting against the nation
of Israel. He's fighting against his own
tribe, and he's bringing back spoils from the Israelites. Well, we know that wasn't true. David never spoiled his own people. But he was fighting with some
of those descendants of the nations that God had told Israel to eliminate
when they went into the land of Canaan, which they did not
do. But he made this king think that
he was fighting his own people. And this man was so deceived.
I want you to look here in verse 9 of chapter 29. This man was
so deceived that his estimate of David was he is like an angel
of God. Like an angel of God. You see
that in verse 9. He said, I know that thou art
good in my sight. He's talking to David. This king,
I know that thou art good in my sight as an angel of God. Now he deceived this man. Now,
I have three points to the message. I pray the Lord will bless it
to all of us here this evening and teach us and encourage us
and strengthen us in this wonderful truth that goodness and mercy
shall follow us all the days of our lives. First, let's see
David's problem or his difficulty. Let's look at verses 1 and 2.
Now the Philistines gathered together all their armies to
Aphid and the Israelites pitched by a fountain which is in Jezreel. And the lords of the Philistines
passed on by hundreds and by thousands. But David and his
men passed on in the reward or the rearward with H's. Now, here's David. Can you picture this? Here's
David, a man after God's own heart, among the enemies of God. Among the enemies of God, the
armies of Philistines marching to war. Here are these various
Tribes are marching to war, and there you see David and his men.
They're among them. And as you think about that,
it looks to me, the reason I said David's difficulty or his problem,
he's got two alternatives now. Here he is with the enemies of
God. marching with their armies to
fight the Israelites. He's got two alternatives, two
things that he can do now. First, when the battle begins,
when the battle begins and the armies are engaged, he and his
men could conduct themselves like cowards. They could turn. They could turn and run to the
back and not fight. Now should he choose to do that,
that was one alternative, one way out of this dilemma, this
problem, would be to act like cowards and to run when the battle
began. But if he did that, remember
this, no matter how the battle turned out, this man has been
anointed to be the king over Israel. Is there any way that
the nation of Israel would ever allow a coward to be their king? Of course not. And that's exactly
what he would appear to be. If he commands his men, his 600
men, when the battle starts, rather than fight, rather than
kill an Israelite, let's turn tails and let's go to the back
and let's escape. That's one thing he could do.
The second thing I see that he could do, when the battle began,
he could go and do what Achiff, this king, was convinced that
he would do. And what was that? The king,
Achiff, was convinced that David would fight the Israelites. that he would kill his own people
in this battle. Now, should he do that, again,
no matter how the battle turned out, he would never have been
accepted to be king over Israel. There's no way they would have
ever, the nation of Israel, would have ever allowed someone so
unworthy to fight against his own people to be their ruler,
to be their king. So what will he do? What will he do? That's a problem,
isn't it? Can you see that? That's a dilemma
that this man is in. And he put himself in this position. Remember that. He chose to leave
the Judah and go among the Philistines, the enemies of God. He chose
to deceive this man. He did what he wanted to do out
of either fear or unbelief, or both, fear and unbelief. He's put himself into this situation. Oh, but this is where, my second
point, this is where we see the goodness and mercy of the Lord. The goodness and mercy of the
Lord. Let's read verses three through
five. Then said the princes of the Philistines, when they saw
David and his men, remember there's five lords, But four of these
lords, the princes, when they saw, what do these Hebrews here? What is David and his men? They
were Israelites, they were Hebrews. What are they doing here? We're
going out to fight them, to battle Israel. And here they are among
us. And Ahab said, now this is the
prince that he had deceived. He said unto the princes of the
Philistines, is not this David, the servant of Saul, the king
of Israel, which hath been with me these days, or these years? Now look, and I have found no
fault in him since he fell unto me unto this day. Well. The princes were not so impressed. The princes of the Philistines
were wroth with him, the king now. And the princes of the Philistines
said unto him, make this fellow return that he may go again to
his place which thou hast appointed him and let him not go down with
us to battle, lest in the battle he be an adversary to us. For
wherewith should he reconcile himself unto his master, should
it not be with the heads of these men? Speaking about his men,
their men. Is not this David, of whom they
sang one to another, and dances sang Saul, slew his thousands,
and David his 10,000? Four of the lords of the Philistines,
when they saw David and his men, they were immediately alarmed. They were immediately afraid
of what might happen. They knew, I mean, David had
a reputation. He had already killed their giant,
their champion, and they knew that he was a valiant man, a
great warrior. And he had been praised in song
and dances by having slain 10,000s of their countrymen. They were
afraid of him. What better way, they say, what,
yes, he's over here and he's fallen out with King Saul, but
what better way for him to reconcile himself to Saul if when the battle
begins, he begins to fight against us? And think about this, where
he was positioned, where David was positioned in the rear ward
of the army, here's the nation of Israel, their men fighting,
here's the Philistines, and here's David. Well, they could see immediately
they would be entrapped. The Israelite army would be in
front of them and David and his army would be behind them. They
would be entrapped there between them, caught in the middle. Now I said that David was in
a difficulty. David was in a dilemma, but David's
God was not. David's God was not. You know
there's a verse in 2 Peter 2 and verse 9 which says, the Lord
knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptation. The Lord knoweth
how. But man, we would be nonplussed
in this situation. How's this going to turn out?
How's David ever going to extricate himself from this situation?
but omnipotent and infinite wisdom, so overruled this whole situation
that these four lords, they sent him back. He didn't have to make
that choice to play the coward or to fight against his own nation.
These men made the choice for him. And there's no doubt in
my mind that God overruled these men, their thoughts. As the scripture
says, the king's heart is in the hand of the Lord. As the
rivers of water, he turneth it whithersoever he will. And one
other scripture comes to my mind when I see how God delivered
David, by his goodness and mercy that followed him. And you look
back in your life, I'm sure you're not any different from me, but
I can look back and see how many times God has delivered me out
of a mess, out of a jam that I got myself into, that he's
been faithful. When I wasn't faithful, David
wasn't faithful, but God's faithful. And he knows how to deliver,
as that scripture says, he knows how to deliver the godly out
of temptation or trials and difficulties. The other scripture is 1 Corinthians
10, where the apostle said, there hath no temptation taken you,
but such as is common to men. But God is faithful, who will
not suffer you to be tempted, above that you are able. but
will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that you
may be able to bear it. That's what happened here, isn't
it? God made a way for David to escape. Now third, let's see David's
conduct. Verse six through 11. Let's see
how he reacts to this. And Ahab called David, and said
unto him, surely, as the Lord liveth, thou hast been upright,
and thy going out, and thy coming in with me, and the host is good
in my sight. For I have not found evil in
thee since the day of thy coming unto me unto this day. Nevertheless,
the Lord's favored thee not. Wherefore, now return, and go
in peace. that thou displeased not the
lords of the Philistines. And David said unto Achish, but
what have I done? What hast thou found in thy servant
so long as I have been with thee unto this day, that I may not
go fight against the enemies of my lord the king? And Achish
answered and said to David, I know that thou art good in my sight
as an angel of God. Notwithstanding, the princes
of the Philistines have said he shall not go up with us to
the battle. Wherefore, now rise up early
in the morning with our master's servants that are come with thee,
and as soon as ye be up early in the morning, and have light,
depart. And David and his men rose up
early to depart in the morning to return into the land of the
Philistines, and the Philistines went up to Jezreel. Several things that I want to
mention from those verses. First of all, we see how easy,
how easy it is for a man to deceive men. How easy it is. How easy it is
for men to deceive other men. This man, he looked at David
like an angel of God. And David all the time was, using
deceit and craftiness and deceiving this man. You know, people, there's
a scripture in Psalm 50, I believe it is, it says, thou thoughtest
that I was altogether such in one as thou art. And because
it's so easy to deceive our fellow men, people get the idea that
they can deceive God, that God may be deceived. This man was
deceived by David. But you know, God isn't like
us. Thou thoughtest that I was altogether
such in one as thou art. But that's not the case. That's
not true. And men, preachers, we need to
warn men. We need to warn men and advise
men that the one with whom we have to do cannot be deceived. You know that verse in Hebrews
chapter 4 and verse 13, the apostle wrote, neither is there any creature
that is not manifest in his sight, that is in God's sight. There's
no creature that's not manifest, open, but all things, all things
are naked All things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him
with whom we have to do. And we all have to do with Him.
He's the only God there is. And He's our God. He's our Creator. And we all are going to meet
Him when we leave this world. We all have to do with Him. And
everything is open. Everything is naked unto Him.
You know, one of the reasons that you have these guard lights
around your property and motion lights and things like that is
because men love darkness, don't they? And the reason men love
darkness, our Lord said, is because their deeds are evil. And people
think because it's dark and other men can't see. But with God,
it matters not whether it's dark or light. He sees all. He knows all. Yes, David knew
this when he wrote Psalm 139. Now, I was thinking, we don't
know when David wrote the various Psalms, but I know this, when
he wrote Psalm 139, he knew, he knew that God knows everything
about us. Because part of what he said
there, he said, thou knowest my down-sitting, talking to God. You know when I sit down, every
time I sit down, Lord, thou knowest my down setting. Thou understandest
my thought afar off. Even our thoughts are open and
naked unto him with whom we have to do. David, he knew better
when he wrote that psalm. So I just point that out to how
easy it is for a person, even to deceive himself, Men may deceive
themselves into believing all is well, all is right, and all
the time things may not be well, things may not be right. And
I know they're not if we're not in Christ, because out of Christ
there's nothing but condemnation. A second thing that appears to
me, we see how David, I believe he keeps up his deception, don't
you? I cannot help but believe that
when David heard that word, nevertheless, come out of that king's mouth.
Look at that, I believe in verse, what, verse eight. Oh, it's in verse 6. The king
said, For I have not found evil in thee since the day of thy
coming unto me unto this day. Nevertheless, I believe I just
believe David. He just breathed a sigh of relief. Nevertheless, you're not going.
He's delivered. He's helped out of the mess he'd
got himself into. I just believe he was so happy
to hear that. Nevertheless, the lords of the
Philistine said, you're not going with us. But you know, he acts
like, in verse eight, he's grieved. He's grieved over there. King,
King, but what have I done? I was looking forward to this. This was my opportunity to really
show myself to you how loyal I am. What have I done? What
have I done? I believe he's continuing with
that deceit when he spoke those words. He was sent home so he didn't
have to choose between those two alternatives that I mentioned.
But in verse eight, he acts like he was grieved, offended. that
he was sent home, that this man was questioning his integrity. Well, I'm sure tonight that all
of us are comforted in knowing that God's goodness and mercy
shall continue following us all the days of our lives, just like
it did David. I don't know when he wrote Psalm
23. Maybe it was after this. But
I think of all the examples that we have seen as we've kind of
gone through this book of 1 Samuel, how many times did God deliver
David? Twice, you know, the King Saul
threw a javelin at him once to pin him to the wall. Surely goodness
and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. And then
he was in that cave and Saul turns in there with his men.
And God puts Saul to sleep, doesn't he? So David is able to escape. And then once again, in that
valley, he goes down to where Saul is sleeping. And not only
Saul, but all of his soldiers are around him. All of his guards,
his bodyguards, all around him. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me. We may not see these things,
But we may confidently know and believe, my friends, that God's
goodness and mercy is following us all the days of our lives. Something else that came to my
mind when we think of this truth of God's goodness and mercy all
the days of our lives is we must guard against presumption. I
want you to look in Numbers just a moment. Turn back to Numbers
chapter 15. You say, what do you mean by
presumption? I mean by taking this truth that goodness and
mercy shall follow us all the days of our life and think that
we have no responsibility. And we just go into this, even
though we may know it's wrong, We may think it's wrong, or the
Word of God may teach us that it's wrong, but we know that
goodness and mercy is going to follow us, so we're just going
to go into it anyway, believing that God's going to deliver us
like He did David. In Numbers chapter 15 we read
in verse 29, you shall have one law for him that sinneth through
ignorance, both for him that is born among the children of
Israel and for the stranger that sojourneth among them. Now watch
this, but the soul that doeth aught presumptuously, whether
he be born in the land or stranger, the same reproacheth the Lord. And that soul shall be cut off
from among his people." Doing something presumptuously, presuming. It's kind of like in Romans when
Paul, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid,
God forbid. And I want you to turn to one
other place in Psalm 19. David prayed against presumptuous
sins and we should do so likewise. In Psalm 19, verse 12, David said, Who can understand
his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret faults. Keep back thy servant also from
presumptuous sins. Let them not have dominion over
me. Then shall I be upright, and
I shall be innocent from the great transgression. Let the
words of my mouth, meditation of my heart, be acceptable in
thy sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer. David prayed
that the Lord would keep him, keep him back from presumptuous
sins. This is something that we should
pray for as well. You know that last verse in that
psalm, that's a wonderful prayer, isn't it? That's a wonderful
prayer. You might think sometimes, well,
maybe I don't know what to pray. Well, here it is. Here's something
we can always pray. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my Redeemer. Well I pray the Lord would bless
these words and that all of us