Keep sharing good news without ads.
No description available
248, 248 in the Trinity.
I have no tremendously encouraging words.
About the mercy of our Lord Jesus that we committed a treason against him and he kindly has redeemed us and restored us. What a savior we have. Welcome to everyone. Only announcement I have today is that we have the Truro meeting and that's this evening at 5 .30 and we're actually meeting at the Erskine building.
And I don't know if we really updated you properly, but after our last congregational meeting where we made the decision to hold onto the building a little while, if we had renters, well, the renters are renting now, so they're coming every week and so that helps us to be able to afford to keep the building for a little while longer as we see what goes on in Truro and make decisions about whether we would want to use that building in the future there or not.
As we made the decision back in the spring, that will be evaluated in the spring meeting. So, yeah, that's something to keep praying about. Please pray for Truro. A little bit discouraging right now, honestly, as far as people that are showing interest.
And I've seen this many, many a time where you have periods like that and we don't know what God will do, but it's an alert to us that we really need to pray and to pursue the Lord in this and to think about trying to have a meeting with the other men that are involved, the other ministers and elders from their churches, and to consider what way we can move forward, even considering starting having some worship services there rather than just a Bible study and prayer meetings at this time.
So please do pray for us as we evaluate those things before the Lord and seek to do His will. It's all in His hands and He's the one that builds His kingdom and we trust Him to do that according to His wisdom.
Well, we come to worship the Lord, our God. So please stand and let's prepare our hearts to come to Him with a time of silent prayer and preparation. People of God, hear now the call to worship our God.
Oh, come let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the Lord, our maker, for He is our God and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand. Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, as in the day of trial in the wilderness when your fathers tested me.
They tried me, though they saw my work. Let's look to God in prayer. Oh, gracious Heavenly Father, we come before you today with great thanksgiving for your kindness and your mercies to us. Oh Lord, that you should call us to be your worshipers and to come before you, oh Lord, we who are sinners and who are unworthy of the least of your mercies.
Father, we have so many mercies every day. Anyone who is here alive in the world today has received an abundance of mercy from you, things that we in no way deserve. And Father, truly, we deserve punishment in hell forever and ever.
And what we have is less than that. It is your great mercies to us. But oh Lord, you have done so much more in that you have come in your kindness to redeem us. You have come even to provide atonement for our sins, to bear our sins for us.
We praise you, Lord Jesus, that you, the Son of God, left the glories of heaven and came here on our account. And as we sang in the song earlier, ours is treason. We committed treason against you. That is our crime.
We sought to overthrow you from your eternal throne. You are our creator. And we sought to unseat you and to seat ourselves upon the throne in your place, just as Absalom sought to do to David. And Lord, we recognize that this is a very high crime.
It is one thing to do that to an earthly king. It is one thing to do that to an earthly king who has sinned and done things that are unworthy of the throne. But we did it to the one who is the most high God, who is our creator, who is the one who is worthy of all worship and adoration and praise, who had done nothing but good to us.
And Father, we see the great wickedness that was in us. We see it and we don't see it. We don't see it so clearly. We feel that we do not even deserve to be punished as you have appointed for that treason.
Father, we pray that you would humble us and that we would come to terms with the reality of the situation. We pray that we would see things in the light of your truth, for your truth is truth. We pray, oh Lord, that we would understand and be able to worship you more ardently as those who know that your mercies are far greater than we even can recognize.
We pray, Lord, that you would stretch us, Lord, that we would see more and more of your glory. Oh Lord, we pray that we would not harden our hearts for even those people who you have redeemed, the church that you have called to be your people.
There is still treason in us, Lord. So often it shows up in our lives in all sorts of ways. And we pray, Lord, that you would forgive us, that you would have mercy on us. So often we feel justified in rejecting what you have told us to do and how you have told us to live and how you have told us to respond to people, even to our enemies.
And we look at it as something that is really not something that is morally obligated, a moral obligation for us. Oh Lord, it is your word. It is your commandment. It is your authority. And I pray that you would help us, Lord, lift up our, to lift up our eyes to you, to your majesty, to your glory and dominion, that we would fear you, oh Lord, that we would fear you in a beautiful way that causes us to admire your great glory and to desire to be united to you through the way that you have provided and no other way.
For if we fear you, Lord, there is no other way that we can come to you, but through Jesus Christ. We understand that. There is no other way. And we praise you for that way that you have provided. Father, help us in our afflictions.
We often feel justified because of our afflictions to rebel. And we pray, Lord, that we would not, that you would help us to bear patiently with our infirmities and the trials and difficulties and the wrongs that are done to us.
And help us, Lord, to think about how our Lord Jesus responded to such things. Oh Lord, give us grace that we may be like him. Have mercy upon us, Lord, and help us. Please, Lord, continue to provide for us.
We thank you for the nation that we live in and for the freedoms that we continue to enjoy here. As we see many things eroding, we pray, Father, that you would curb that erosion and that you would call us back to yourself, that we would repent as a nation and that we would turn to you and seek to follow you, oh Lord, that we would fear you as a nation and that we would bring glory and honor to you.
Father, bless your church and our land. Help us to be a faithful witness to you and for our light to shine in the world. Help us all to live as those who are pursuing Catholicity, who are pursuing what makes for peace and unity in the church and not what makes for division.
Father, we want to do what you have called us to do in that regard and not to act according to our own wisdom and our own passions and desires. Have mercy upon us, oh Lord. Be near to us. Bless us this day that we may adore you.
We ask this in Jesus' name, amen. Let's confess together the mystery of godliness. It is printed for you in the bulletin. It's from scripture, from 1 Timothy 3 .16. And this is where God has revealed to us the way of godliness.
And that mystery has been fully revealed when Jesus Christ came and we saw what the way of godliness is that God has provided. It was done before our eyes and now we are able to rejoice and delight in that.
So people of God, what do you believe about the mystery of godliness? And without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the spirit, seen by angels, preached among the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up in glory.
Praise be to his name. Now let's sing together Psalm 75 in the book of Psalms for singing. Psalm 75.
That song tells us a couple of things about God.
That are important for us to recognize. Many things about God, really. But related to what we're looking at today, God is the one that exalts people to lead in a nation or in a family or wherever. He's the one that appoints those who are in authority over us.
He's also the one that brings them down. And he does this according to his sovereign will. And we should not contend with what God does. We can pray and ask him to raise up those who fear God and who are honest and true and sincere, but we have to submit to God in these things and not to commit treason the way Absalom does in the passage we're looking at today.
And another thing that it tells us is that when there are wicked rulers, God is the one that will judge them. And so there are times when it can be right for a people to rise up and to resist authority that is over them.
But we have to be very careful about that because as a general rule, we are to leave vengeance to God. And he's the one that will deal with our enemies. We don't take it into our own hands. Again, the way that Absalom did.
So yeah, we need to, that song is very helpful for us. Jude is our New Testament scripture reading today. And it talks about this kind of problem as well. And Jude is warning those who are following Christ to be aware of those in the church that were promoting a kind of defiance that was not godly.
Here is the word of God. Jude, a bond servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James to those who are called, sanctified by God the Father and preserved in Jesus Christ. Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you.
Just want you to notice how he addresses them. And he mentioned specifically something you don't always hear those who are preserved in Jesus Christ. And that's because he's admonishing them to do things that will make for their preservation.
And at the end of it, there's a benediction about God preserving us and looking to him to preserve us. So that's a focus here. They have to hold on to the faith that God has given them as his people and to contend for that faith lest they go off into error.
So continuing on, verse three. Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints.
For certain men have crept in unnoticed who long ago were marked out for this condemnation. Ungodly men who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.
But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. And the angels who did not keep their proper domain but left their own abode, he has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day.
As Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
Likewise, also these dreamers defile the flesh, reject authority, and speak evil of dignitaries. Yet Michael the archangel, in contending with the devil when he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, the Lord rebuke you.
But these speak evil of whatever they do not know and whatever they know naturally, like brute beasts. And these things, they corrupt themselves. Woe to them! For they have gone in the way of Cain and have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit and perished in the rebellion of Korah.
These are spots in your love feasts while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves. There are clouds without water, carried about by the winds like autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots, raging waves of the sea, foaming up their own shame, wandering stars for whom has reserved the blackness of darkness forever.
Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, behold, the Lord comes with 10 ,000 of his saints to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds, which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
These are grumblers, complainers, walking according to their own lusts, and they mouth great swelling words, flattering people to gain advantage. But you, beloved, remember the words which were spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ, how they told you that there would be mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts.
These are sensual persons who cause divisions, not having the spirit. But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
And on some, have compassion, making a distinction, but others, save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment defiled by the flesh. Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to God our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever.
Amen. Amen, indeed. What a great passage of Scripture for us. You might do well to, if you're going over the sermon again in the afternoon, when you get home this evening, you might do well to read Jude again and think about it in light of what we're looking at today with Absalom and people that are among God's covenant people that rise up in treason against God himself, ultimately, is who they're against, the anointed of the Lord.
All right, let's sing a song then about that. It's our song of focus at this time, a bit of it. The last part of it, Psalm 55 C. Psalm 55 C. Urging to sing with our Lord Jesus against his enemies who are also our enemies as we are in him.
Well, it's actually been a full month since I preached from 2 Samuel. And we did have, of course, a couple of weeks ago, we looked at Psalm 55 as our song of focus. It kind of brought us back into this series, but we had Iliad here for a couple of weeks, and then we had the baptism sermon last week.
So we need to step back into 2 Samuel again, and we're now at a place where Absalom's insurrection really is launched, you might say. In chapter 15, we see him actually breaking out against his father, David, who was the anointed king over Israel.
We have reason to marvel as we look at this passage at how shrewd Absalom is in the way that he deals with this situation. I was amazed in studying it more fully than I had ever before to see that. There can be little doubt that Satan and his angels were quite involved with helping Absalom in his counsel and devising all of these amazing plans.
They were inspired by Satan. Let me remind you, or inform you, if you're not familiar with this account, what had led up to all of this, because the background is important to kind of understand why Absalom is doing this as we look at the situations that have gone on.
David was the king that God had chosen to govern Israel and to govern them according to God's word, as God's people. David stood out from Israel's other kings that followed after him, as well as Saul, who went before him, as a model such that God's son, Jesus, who was to be born to David's line, was hereafter, after David, called the son of David.
He was set out, David was set out as a type of what a king should be. God described him as a man after my own heart. But even though David was a model, he was far from perfect. The most glaring offense on his record was committing adultery with Uriah's wife Bathsheba, and then arranging for the death of Uriah on the battlefield to try to cover that up.
It was such a heinous offense that God exposed it, when David was trying to hide it, by Nathan the prophet, and Nathan told him that David repented, and Nathan told him that God had indeed forgiven him, but that David would bear the consequences of what he had done for the rest of his life, because he, as a public figure, had done such a shameful thing, that God would display his displeasure with that before all of the nations, so that the testimony of God would not be blemished by that.
In a sense, it was blemished, but by God dealing with David, you see, he showed that this was not acceptable to him for his king. But overall, what was unique about David is that David was a man who responded to God and recognized, except for those exceptional times when he didn't, when he sinned, but overall, his posture as a king, was he recognized that God was the one who ruled, not him.
That's what made him unique and set him as a model. In chapters 13 and 14, we saw the beginning of the troubles that God said that he was gonna send upon him. And the first thing that happened was that David's oldest son, Amnon, who would have presumably been the next king, I mean, God might change that, but that would be presumed, raped his half-sister, Tamar, who was David's third son at that time, Absalom's sister.
Absalom then was angry with Amnon, as understandably, and he developed a deep resentment toward David because David didn't deal with Amnon. He didn't deal with him the way he should have. And so Absalom was quite distressed about that, and after much time, he put on a feast, invited all of David's sons to the feast, and he killed his brother, Amnon.
He took the matter into his own hands. His resentment for David deepened even more after that, when he, Absalom, having fled to his, his grandfather was a king, and he fled to Gesher, where he lived. And while he was there, David did nothing to deal with Absalom.
He didn't bring him back, he didn't punish him, he didn't do anything. So he lost even more respect for his father. And then at the end of chapter 14, we saw that Absalom forced David to deal with it one way or the other, and David then ended up fully restoring Absalom with no consequences.
And the result of that was not that Absalom then said, oh, isn't my father kind? But he had even more disrespect for him, which is often the case. Parents think sometimes that by being soft, that they will make things so much better, when in fact, they actually harden their children even more because they're not upholding what is just, and they become those who are not respected.
The father needs to be respected for upholding God's ways in his home, or else he's not respectable, and he won't be respected. So David's leadership here was weak in the whole affair, and Absalom had even greater disdain for his father after this.
Chapter 15, one through 12, today's text, gives us an account of how then Absalom initiated a treasonous insurrection so that he could take David's throne for himself. He was, here we see, defiance fueled by resentment.
And this is something that is too near to all of us, too much a part of our own lives. Looking at a passage like this, our tendency is to be like Pharisees and say, look at that terrible Absalom. Look at all the things that he did.
But if we look at it as real Christians, the way we should, then we're gonna look at it and say, wow, I see so much of that in me, so much of what is in Absalom. And that's what we want to do as God's people because we have a savior.
We can be honest about our sins, and we come before him asking him to have mercy on us and to deliver us. So listen to this account and consider well what it says. 2 Samuel 15, this is the word of God, verses one through 12.
After this had happened, after he'd been restored, after this had happened that Absalom provided himself with chariots and horses and 50 men to run before him. Now Absalom would rise early and stand beside the way to the gate.
So it was whenever anyone who had a lawsuit came to the king for a decision that Absalom would call to him and say, what city are you from? And he would say, your servant is from such and such a tribe of Israel.
Then Absalom would say to him, look, your case is good and right, but there is no deputy of the king to hear you. Moreover, Absalom would say, oh, that I were made judge in the land and everyone who has any suit or cause would come to me.
Then I would give him justice. And so it was whenever anyone came near to bow down to him, that he would put out his hand and take him and kiss him. In this manner, Absalom acted toward all Israel who came to him, the king, I mean, who came to the king for judgment.
So Absalom stole the hearts of the men of Israel. Now it came to pass after 40 years that Absalom said to the king, please let me go to Hebron and pay the vow which I made to the Lord, for your servant took a vow while I dwelt in Gesher in Syria saying, if the Lord indeed brings me back to Jerusalem, then I will serve the Lord.
And the king said to him, go in peace. So he arose and went to Hebron. Then Absalom sent spies throughout the tribes of Israel saying, as soon as you hear the sound of the trumpet, then you shall say, Absalom reigns in Hebron.
And with Absalom went 200 men invited from Jerusalem and they went along innocently and did not know anything. When Absalom sent for Ahithophel, the Gileadite, David's counselor from his city, from Gilo, while he offered sacrifices and the conspiracy grew strong for the people with Absalom continually increased in number.
May God add his blessing to our understanding and profit from the reading of his word. Surely there is too much of this defiance and resentment in the world. And surely there is too much of it in the church.
And surely there is too much of it in our own hearts. It's very hard for us to admit defiance and resentment because it's the very nature of resentment to justify itself. That's what resentment does. I've been wronged, so therefore it's right for me to do whatever it is that I'm doing.
That's the way it works. So let's ask the Holy Spirit then to help us to admit it and bring it to Christ as we take a deeper look at this defiance driven by resentment. Heavenly Father, I pray that you would help us as we look at this passage, that you would help us to open our hearts before you, oh Lord, and that you would help us to receive the counsel of your word as those who are your people, who are redeemed people if we are indeed redeemed.
Father, that we would receive that counsel from your word, that we might be able to confess sin that is in us, that the light would shine in us. We would be able to confess our sin and not to deny it and to come before you, Lord, for help, that we may be forgiven and that we may change.
We ask this in Jesus' name, amen. So what do we see about resentful defiance as it is displayed in Absalom here? First, we see that resentful defiance rejects the virtues of those it resents. We ought to imitate the virtue of those who are in authority over us, not their vices.
Many times we imitate their vices and we resent even their virtues and treat their virtues as if they were vices. Absalom gives a clear illustration of this. One of David's strengths was the way that he did not behave like a pagan king.
He didn't put on airs, he didn't go about with a big display of his importance as king because he recognized that he was under the Lord. But here, Absalom, you see, who is, again, the grandson of a pagan king that he had spent some time with, he took on these 50 men to run before him.
As soon as he had the resources, David restored him and he now had access to finances and such, so he hires these 50 men to run before him so that when Absalom is coming to town, there's this big entourage and a big importance, fanfare and all the rest of it, decked out with their finery and all the other things.
He wanted to make a display, I am the king's son. You know, here I am, look at me, I'm royalty. This was the kind of thing that was going on here. He, now David, he did, as we have seen, sin greatly in the matter of Bathsheba when he lost sight of the fact, he rebelled and did not submit to God in that matter.
But his overall understanding of the nature of his kingship was that he was to be humble before the Lord. Remember that his wife, Michael, was offended when David, because he was not dignified, welcome to the king today.
Now she had other reasons to be offended with him too, but that was the thing that really, really bothered her. But as soon as Absalom was restored, you see, Absalom did this to look impressive. So we all have in us a bent for worldliness and it is very common to see those who were in a home where they were taught modesty in clothing and carefulness with food, drink, entertainment, such things, observance of the Lord's day, tithing, regularity in private and family worship, when they get older to break free of those things and even treat those things as if they were vices.
They will justify this by saying that other Christians do not practice these things and that their parents were too uptight and legalistic with these things. Now, in some cases, it may be true that they were in fact pharisaical about some of these things, but resentment is not the proper response.
Resentment causes children or congregants not to correct legalism, but rather to cast off things that God has actually commanded, like modesty or godly discipline, as if those things were evil. I have seen people, for example, who leave a church that wrongly said, it is sinful to drink alcoholic beverages, and I saw many people do this.
When they leave those churches, they end up drinking to excess and they justify it because I'm no legalist, and that's not a proper way to respond. The command of God is to be not drunk with wine, and so when that is done, that is a reaction, a resentful reaction.
Instead of learning to glorify God, they use drink to transgress His commandment. So this kind of behavior is ungodly. It shows a defiant, resentful spirit, and it is common. Second, resentful defiance is eager to stir up resentment and defiance in others against those that they resent.
This can even become the whole driving force of their lives. You see people sometimes that will come on, you know, like maybe they have a famous father or something like that, and they'll come on and their whole life is spent talking about how bad their father is and writing books about it and going on television shows and interviews and all sorts of things like that.
This is the kind of thing that we see with Absalom here. His father had indeed done wrong in not dealing with Amnon when he raped Absalom's sister Tamar. He had also done wrong in taking multiple wives to himself that would have meant that he had neglected some of his sons, neglected Absalom.
But instead of appealing to his father and bringing the matter before God prayerfully, Absalom had murdered Amnon. That was not, that was a response of resentment, sinful resentment, rather than a response, a godly response.
But he did not stop there. He made it his passion to get others to resent David as much as he did. As he wanted everyone to see the king the way he saw him as a man who had no interest in administering justice, which wasn't really true of David.
He was very zealous. He got up early and tried to head people off who were coming to David, we see that in our text, to bring cases of injustice to David for, to his appellate courts that were at Jerusalem.
Like, you know how if they didn't get justice in their own territory, in their own village or whatever, they could go to more of a provincial place and still not there, then they could come on to Jerusalem.
It was like an appeal system. Apparently, Absalom would always tell whoever was there that they had a good case without even hearing the other side. That's real easy to do when he wasn't rendering judgment.
You can imagine that one person comes with their case and he says, oh, you've got a good case, but they won't hear you here. You won't get any justice here, I tell ya. It's not even worth your trouble.
And then the other person comes that was on the other side of the issue. Oh, you've got a good case. You know, he didn't ever have to make a judgment where, as always happens, one party is unhappy and the other party is happy.
And so he could sit there and be like, you know, boy, if you came to me, you'd get what you were looking for all the time. As he didn't have to deal officially with anything. He was simply on the side of whoever he was talking to.
So Absalom's goal was for everyone to see the real David, right? That was his goal, the real David in his mind. And, you know, we know that this isn't even quite true because we saw just in the previous chapter that a woman came to David who was a widow and David didn't say, get away from me.
I don't have time to talk to you. But he heard her case and he listened to it and he acted and rendered judgment according to what he saw. So, you know, this is not even completely true what Absalom is saying here.
Absalom's goal though was to get everyone to look at his father with resentment. You all know of the tendency here. If you are resentful, especially towards someone in authority, you wanna get a bunch of other people to agree with you.
And, you know, to agree with you about how difficult whoever it is is. You will talk about it and you'll seek out people that seem like they maybe share your opinion and then you'll try to convince them if they don't.
You might pretend to yourself that you are just helping. The most diabolical thing about this is that people do that about God. What happens when people resent God? When they don't like the way God governs the world?
They try very hard to get other people to agree with them. They want their resentment to be expanded to other people. They see someone zealously serving God, they're rankled like, what are you doing serving him?
And they come and say, look at how God, look at all the birth defects, look at all the things that are going on in the world. How can you serve a God like that? And they begin to promote that. They want allies in their resentment.
It's very natural for us to do that. We have to guard ourselves against that. And as Christians, we can even do that about things that we don't like about God, that we can come to other people and say, well, I don't know if that commandment's really true, that's really, look at this, what about this, what about that?
And we can begin to try to pull them over to oppose God and something that he has actually said and to twist it up. Very, very diabolical. Third thing that resentful defiance does, it wants the affection of those who are devoted to the person that they resent to be toward themselves.
Okay, you see this very much with Absalom. You want them to see what a good person you are and how unlike the person you resent is, that you're opposite to them. So maybe they're nasty and mean-spirited, then you're really loving and kind.
And maybe you had a very critical mother. She was always criticizing you. And so you go out and you become a flatterer. You're not really responding to God and developing godliness, but you're becoming some other sin because you're just trying to show that I'm not at all like this person that I resent.
And you see, that's where you're not dealing with God then. So Absalom did this in two ways. First, with those that he intercepted who were coming with their cases, he slipped the comment in that we find in verse four.
It's so blatant, isn't it? He says, oh, that I were made judge in the land and everyone who has any suit or cause would come to me and I would give him justice. Well, I have news for him that half of the people who came would not think that he gave justice because there are two parties in every case and they both think they're right.
Now, sometimes it's true that King renders a really great judgment that the other side has to go, okay. But most of the time, people are so twisted in their own cause that that's not the way it comes out.
So anyway, that's Absalom. And then second, when people showed honor to him by bowing to him as the king's son. And again, he was going around with a display of chariots and all this kind of stuff, but he would then reach out to them and kiss them, which now we need to get the cultural thing right here.
That's like a hearty handshake. You know, it's like the politician that's out, you know, and he's going around everybody and he's down there with a farmer, you know, he's got his boots and his hat on, you know, and he's so familiar out there.
And he's just everybody's, you know, buddy. You're my buddy, you know, I'm right in there with you. I understand all the things that you're going through. I've been there myself. You know, I was poor when I was growing up and you find out that they were the son of a, you know, high-end lawyer or something.
But, you know, there's just all this kind of thing that they try to put on. And so this is what Absalom is doing. We're told that Absalom succeeded in stealing the hearts of those who had once been devoted to David, or maybe I should say overall.
Like the whole Israel had been very devoted to David and now they were not. 40 years prior to this time, David had won the hearts of the nation when he killed Goliath the giant and behaved himself with such wisdom as probably an 18-year-old from the chronologies that I would find the most helpful or maybe I like the best, whatever.
He was maybe 18 and he behaved with such wisdom and he had killed Goliath when no one was willing to do that. And chapter 18 describes how everybody loved David. It even says that Jonathan loved David, Saul's son who was in line to be the next king.
And all the people, you know, they were all David, David, David. David won their hearts, but he won their hearts not by being a politician and trying to do so, but simply by serving God with wisdom before everyone.
He wasn't saying, how can I win these people's hearts and making plans like that? He was just serving God. And everybody said, wow, this guy is great. Now, granted, David behaved badly and made it easier for Absalom to begin to steal the hearts of the people.
If David hadn't done some of those things he did with Bathsheba and that kind of thing, then Absalom wouldn't have had an easy job with this. But still, Absalom, you see, he's using his good looks, his charm, and his knack for stirring up resentment in order to get allegiance to himself from David.
Now, just to comment about verse seven that says, now it came to pass after 40 years, that that is by far the best reading in the original Hebrew. You'll find in the margin that there are other readings, and that's because people look at it that obviously, it wasn't 40 years after Absalom had done some of the things that we just read about.
I mean, David only reigned for 40 years. So it's impossible that it's talking about from that time. It doesn't say when it's from. And the most logical thing is that it just talked about the hearts of the people being turned, as it had made a big deal about that with David, that the heart of the people was turned from Saul to David back when David was 18 years old.
Now he's 58 years old, and the hearts of the people were turned from David to Absalom. So that's, I think, the best way to understand that. Floyd Nolan Jones and Matthew Henry kind of points to that from the older times.
There's people that advocate that. I think it's probably the best way to understand that. The fourth thing that Absalom illustrates about resentful defiance is the way that it engages all its powers. The resentful defiant person engages all his powers to hurt the one that he resents.
And the ingenuity here is remarkable. It's just like all the effort and the planning. His plan is to have a coronation service for himself at Hebron, where David had had his coronation when Israel had acknowledged David as their king.
And this is all described in verses seven through 12. The first thing he does is get David himself to support him in going to celebrate his return from his banishment. And he presents himself to David, you see.
His father is, you know, this is something I was praying for, and I made a vow to God, and I said, if you bring me back safely to the land, then I'll offer sacrifices to you, I'll fulfill my vow, I'll get everybody to worship and celebrate your answer to my prayer.
And David's like, oh wow, Absalom is doing better than I thought he was. You know, look, he's never shown much interest in God, but I didn't even realize that he'd made a vow like that. And you know, he's very, David's thrilled to support him.
And so David gives him a green light. Go in peace, go in peace and do everything that you've said. Resources can be used for this. Have a big celebration, you know. Now, in verse 11, it says that he took 200 men from Jerusalem with him.
And these were, we can certainly assume, people that were nobles and elders that were supporters of David. Because it said they didn't know anything about that this was actually a coronation service for Absalom that he was planning.
It was a celebration service, there was gonna be sacrifices, that was all true. He was rejoicing that he had been brought back to the land, but there was something else that was gonna happen. There was a surprise at that event for the people that didn't know.
And so here you have these 200 men that are aligned with David, that are some of his counselors and leaders among the people and they're going up. So everybody goes, oh wow. You know, David is approved of this.
There's this big thing going on at Hebron. People will go up. You see how clever he is? I mean, it's just remarkable to see how clever he is. There is, however, then this surprise at this sacrificial feast.
Absalom, who is indeed now, as far as we can tell, the oldest son of David. We don't know what happened to his second son, by the way. We're just told of his birth. There's nothing else said about that.
Of course, people have written all kinds of histories about that and given him another name and all kinds of things, but we don't have anything in scripture that tells us, a lot of people think that he must have died when he was a child.
We're just not told. But in any case, Absalom is now the oldest living son, so he would be the one that you would expect to be the king. And so he's gonna go and be crowned as king. And again, this was hidden from the 200 men from Jerusalem that wouldn't have been sympathetic to that, but by having them there, it gave the appearance of even, initially, it gave the appearance of his father's support.
And it also drew these men out of Jerusalem who would have been able to help defend Jerusalem from Absalom at this moment of crisis. They would be the ones that would lead and rally the people together and figure out what needed to be done.
They were gone to Hebron with Absalom. So you see, this was a very clever move. Absalom had also gone carefully, about diligently, to find other leaders all over Israel who were discontent with David, which was easy enough to do.
You just strike up a conversation. You know, how do you think David's doing? What do you think about the thing with Bathsheba? And he starts asking them questions and, oh yeah. Well, you know, I was thinking this, and you begin to talk.
He could find people pretty easily. So he knew he'd been working on this. That was his job as far as he was concerned. So it was easy to feel them out a bit. And we're told in verse 12, as an example of that kind of thing, that Ahithophel, who was one of David's former counselors and was known for his incredible wisdom, that he was summoned to come to Absalom at this time and advise him.
And Absalom sent many of the allies that he had into all of the villages and cities of all over Israel with instructions that when you hear the trumpet blow, then announce Absalom is king in Hebron. And so, now think about this.
Think about, you have to think about the ancient world, right, they didn't have internet or all those kind of things. But the way they did this is you would have this thing going on at Hebron, and they would blow a certain trumpet, and then the other people in the next villages would hear that trumpet.
So then they would blow the trumpets. And then the villages next to that would hear it. And it would go throughout the whole land that there would be this great trumpet blast, and then there would be a man there that was designated to orchestrate all of this.
And he would step forward and say, Absalom is king in Israel. So everybody in Israel. Now, Absalom is king in Hebron. You know, this was what he had devised and arranged. Now, in Absalom's mind, the time had come for him to take his father's throne.
And again, he was, as far as people were concerned, the next one that was in line for that. David had restored him. David had approved him going to the celebration, maybe even doing what he was doing here as far as the people knew all over the land, the people that were at the coronation.
Oh, is David supporting this? I wonder why he's not here. You know, whatever. So the motivation, the motivation to hurt those that we resent is incredibly powerful. It shames us as believers that we don't have more zeal for the kingdom of God.
Jesus talks about that, that the world is so clever and so ingenious, so creative in the way that they labor to make a profit and protect themselves and things like that. And we, for the kingdom of God, can be so sluggish and so indifferent.
Then revenge and wanting to have resentment can so fuel a person that they will come up with these elaborate, clever, clever plans. And I say Satan is more than willing to help. He's always involved in political intrigue and machinations of nations and such.
We're shown that clearly in scripture. There are principalities and powers that are over all of these things. But how the church and our whole nation would be transformed if believers were as zealous for promoting God's kingdom as many are for promoting the opposite.
But even worse than our negligence is the way that we participate in this sin of defiance fueled by resentment as Christians. How terribly shameful it is for us who profess Jesus Christ to be so full of resentment ourselves.
Dear believer, if you're honest, do you not recognize that resentment that shows in you? Do you not find that you want to make sure other people see and know how bad those who have wronged you really are?
Do you not find yourself eager to report bad things that they have done and to find others who have been wronged by the same people? And do you not find that it is all too easy to suppose that they have done wrong in ways that they haven't?
And to exaggerate and to embellish the wrongs that they have done. What is the spirit that is in us when we do that? It is a sin that we too often participate in and too often do not confess. As believers, we have a greater sense of just how wicked it is to do this.
So we also are eager to deny it. But that shouldn't be our response to say, this is such a terrible thing. I don't even wanna, I don't even wanna face it. I don't wanna deal with it. We should say, this is such a terrible thing that I can go to my savior with this.
That's the only place I can go and I can confess it. And if I confess it and forsake it, he will have mercy on me and he will deliver me and cleanse me from all unrighteousness. We ought to have him be more eager to deal with it.
And that brings us to the next point. Defiant, resentful people often feel justified. You know, all of you are moral beings. Every person is a moral being. And we see that all the time. It is simply part of what we are as human beings to morally justify ourselves, no matter what we do.
I mean, really, even a bank robber does that. Like most bank robbers don't say, I hate people so much, I'm gonna go and steal from them. The bank robber says, you know, there's so much corporate corruption out there and the whole money system and all these politicians are cheating people and the CEOs own business people.
And this is just my way of getting a piece of the pie that I deserve. And they make it into a moral thing. It's actually a virtue. I'm taken from these people that have been so unjust and I'm a good person and I'm gonna use this for good things in my life and they need to be put in their place.
That's the way people operate. We're moral. We're not, it's very rare that you meet someone that just says, what do I wanna do? Deep in their heart, you know, I wanna just hurt everybody. They may wanna do that, but if they do, they've got a moral reason for it.
Because it's been so, I've been wrong so much by this world and I just, I gotta get justice here. You know, that's the way we operate. And so it's quite likely that Aslam had dwelt so much on David's failings that he actually felt fully justified in doing what he did here.
Do you not feel justified in your anger and paying back evil to people when you do that? When in giving a hurtful response to someone that is wrong, maybe to your spouse? You know, you say that little nasty thing, give that little nasty dig and I got them, they deserve that.
You know, or even withholding good from those to whom it is due when they have a need before you. And I'm not gonna help them, they didn't help me. They weren't nice to me, they didn't do that. Whatever, we justify, we justify it in our own minds.
That's the way that we operate. Aslam did not care that God had anointed David. It appears that he felt justified in rejecting God too, actually. He would say, if this is what God's kingdom is like, then I don't want anything to do with it.
We don't see any evidence of Aslam fearing God except in a pretended way. You hear people say that about church today. They reject it because they've been wronged by the church. You hear atheists and agnostics say that if God made the world and rules it, they do not want anything to do with him because the world is such a corrupt and wicked place.
You hear that a lot, don't you? Ironically, though, they will then tell you that they don't believe in morality. But their whole reason for opposing God is a moral reason because they don't like the way he does things, if he exists, of course, I'll add.
But I could never worship a God because it would be morally offensive to me to have a God like that. But you don't believe in morality, so why would it be morally offensive? Of course, they can say, well, he says these morals, but they all operate, they justify their behavior.
But there is no justification for defiant resentment. Do you know why? It's because all defiant resentment is actually resentment against God. Others may have done you wrong. They may have done you great wrong.
It is wrong, what they have done, and it is great wrong, God says so, and he will judge them. They should be put out of the church if they will not repent of their sin. They should also be judged by the courts in our land if they have committed crimes.
It is wrong. Others may have done you wrong, but that does not justify resentment because God has decreed everything that happens to every one of us. God has planned it down to the last detail. So there is a sense in which what others have done to you is exactly the same thing that God has appointed.
Do you understand? Like, they did it and it was wrong. Like Joseph said to his brothers, you meant it for evil against me, but God meant it for good that I was sold into slavery and that I was brought here and served as a slave for all those years and was in prison and all these things.
God meant it for good. Yeah, people did do wrong to him. It was wrong, but God didn't do wrong to him, and God did what they did. God did it as God who rules over all things and rules over our sinful fallen world.
Peter testified clearly about this concerning the crucifixion of Christ. In Acts 2, 23, he said of Jesus to those who crucified him, him being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified and put to death.
What they did by wicked hands was exactly the fulfillment of what God planned and appointed to be done. They disobeyed God and they were guilty for it and they would be punished for it and they sincerely repented and found mercy, but they did exactly what was appointed.
That means that even though others may have done you great wrong, God has sent what they did into your life and he is God and he has not done you wrong. That changes the way you look at everything. Do you see how it changes it?
Because if you're resentful towards someone and you're reacting against them in a way that is contrary to God, then you're actually reacting resentfully against God because why would you go against what God said?
You should go not away from God, but toward God when that happens. There is no place for defiant resentment against God. This is where we go so wrong in justifying our defiant resentment. We're so proud that we don't truly and really accept that we truly do deserve to go to hell forever.
If we didn't accept that, we would realize that the hardest things that we have ever faced in life are tiny compared to what we actually all deserve and that far less punishment than we deserve. We don't see the depth of our sin and the punishment that it calls for.
Job started out well when God afflicted him, not for particular sins that he had committed either. He hadn't done anything that brought about a chastisement for Job, you rebelled against me, so I'm gonna do this.
Job had been serving God, and yet there was this great avalanche of trouble that came upon him, and we're called to bear that before God in this world. Yes, there were people that did great wrong to Job, murdering his children and doing all kinds of, murdering his servants and taking his animals and all kinds of things.
When Job's wife was overwhelmed with all that had befallen their family, she said to Job, do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die, and what did Job say? Job said in Job 2 .10, you speak as one of the foolish women speaks.
Shall we indeed accept good from God and shall we not accept adversity? In all this, Job did not sin with his lips. So the scripture tells us that what Job said was not wrong. He wasn't saying God did it, and well, no, it was Satan that did it.
No, Satan did it, yes, but God did it. Satan did it for one purpose, God did it for another, and Job was right to acknowledge God is the supreme ruler, and I respond to God. I'm not responding to Satan, I'm not responding to my enemies, I respond to God.
Christian cursing should never be found on your lips. The world shows their resentment by cursing. They curse everything. Curse this, curse that, curse the other thing. They just show their displeasure and their angst against God and what he's doing, and they don't always even say that it's, they'll tell you sometimes it's not against, but it is against God because he's the sovereign ruler, and it's his rule that they're defying, that they're resenting, and that they're opposing.
And Christians, we should not either resort to minstos, where we use a different word, as if that's gonna be acceptable. We're still cursing, we're still resenting whatever God has done. This is not acceptable behavior.
God appointed when the two boys got in a fight, young men got in a fight in the Old Testament, and they brought them before, because one of them cursed, they brought him before the Lord, and God said stone him with stones for cursing.
And we take it so lightly, it rolls off of our lips like it's nothing. It is not nothing. No one should speak in that way. This is not acceptable. Job was right in what he said at first. God said that he was right.
But then, after many more days of suffering and suffering the accusations of these three friends on top of that, Job began to struggle with resentment himself. And I'm sure that all of us would have too, but that doesn't excuse it, okay?
He began to question God, and even to accuse God of doing wrong. The Lord showed up and revealed his glory, and he dealt with Job very tenderly, because again, he had pushed Job to that point with all that he had sent to him.
But the Lord asked Job if he, the Lord Almighty, had needed Job's counsel when he created the world. Job, I'm trying to remember, were you there when I created the world? Did you come to me and say, you know, you really ought to do it like this?
And I said, yeah, that's right, that's a good idea. Of course not. So now, Job, are you gonna come and tell me how to govern the world and how to rule the world and what I should send and what I should not send into the world and into your life?
Remember Job's response? Again, he was a godly man. And Job said, I abhor myself. I repent in dust and ashes. I spoke, my words were ill-advised. I should have never said those things. I put my hand over my mouth.
He recognized the authority of God. Now my eyes see you, he said. Therefore, I abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes. So you see, instead of resentment and defiance, we need to turn to the Lord when we have been wronged.
When we have been wronged by others, our response should not be to them, it should be to God. We need to respond, and how do we respond to God? We respond in the way that he directs us to respond in the situation.
And that's not the same always. Except, first of all, it means that we accept what he has done with humility and with admiration of his authority, glory, and justice, like Job did initially and after he repented, just like that, to say, Lord, you do whatever.
You give good to me, you give bad things to me. Yeah, I'm gonna cry out for mercy, and I'm gonna ask you for mercy because you tell me to do that, but I'm not gonna charge you with being unfair or doing wrong to me in any way whatsoever because you are God.
Follow this closely, your resentment to God when you do not do what he says to do when others wrong you, you are supposing that such great wrong has been done in the world to you that God has done wrong.
That's what you're doing, you're saying that God did wrong, and that's what is not acceptable. We need to respond then to the one who has wronged us or others the way God directs us in accordance with the place that we have in the world, that God has given us in the world, and in accordance with the directions he's given to us.
If we're in authority, then we need to correct those that are under us according to God's will in his way. If we are a parent, we're to use the rod and verbal rebuke to correct our children as is whatever is most appropriate in the situation, and we're to use these things as God directs to correct them.
If we're a civil ruler, then we need to bring the penalty that God has appointed to those who have done wrong, sometimes that could even be a capital punishment, or it can be fines or other things like that.
If we're under the authority of those who have wronged us, on the other hand, we're under authority, then we may respectfully appeal to them, especially if they're godly, if they will not hear, unless it is such an offense that we need to report it to the elders, or even to the civil magistrate if they've committed a great crime, in which case we are then by that appealing to God, because he appointed them to execute vengeance in the world, they're his ministers, so we're not taken into our own hands when we do that, we're appealing to the authority that God has appointed, but we're to bear it patiently if it's something that's not of that level, or if it is of that level, we're still to be patient, but we don't necessarily need to report it on to anyone else, we pay them respect, and we pray to the Lord for mercy to deal with us and them.
We need to leave vengeance to God, which includes appealing to those in authority, as I said already. If the one who wronged us is a peer, not someone who is over us or under us, we may need to bring them to someone who is in authority, or if it's not something that is of that level at that point, we should first, ordinarily, as the scripture directs us, go to that one, and show them they're wrong, between us and them, and call them to repent, not go and broadcast it to everyone else and get other people to say what a terrible person that is, we need to go and try to resolve it with them.
We should do it prayerfully, if they hear we've gained our brother, you know what the scripture says here, many of you, in Matthew 18, if they do not hear, we take some other people with us, and we don't tell them about it before we go, the first time they hear about it is when we go to meet with that person, and then we lay it out, and if they hear, then we've won them, if they won't hear, then, and they agree with us that wrong has been done, then we bring it before the elders of the church, the assembly of the elders.
Of course, if the person is not a Christian, then you can't take them to the elders, but at some point, you may have to drop it with them, and they may be as an enemy to you, but then you're told how to treat your enemies.
What are you supposed to do with enemies? You're supposed to pray for them, you're supposed to love them, you're supposed to try to overcome evil with good. You look for opportunities to do what is good in the eyes of all people, and as you do that, you're seeking, you're doing what God tells you to do.
You see, you're reacting to God, whereas if there is resentment and defiance, then you think God and they have done you wrong, and you just become sour, and you don't listen to God, you don't care what God says, you take the matter into your own hands.
So you see why I say that there is too much of this in us. Instead of resentment and bitterness, we need to respond to God and what he has told us to do. Look to Jesus as your example. If anyone might have been resentful, it is he.
He was called by his father to leave the glory of heaven and to come here as a man so that he might be our priest and atone for our sins. What a calling. He was called to bear the punishment that is due to those who hated him and who had wronged him and who had committed treason against him, who is the king of all eternity.
He suffered more than anyone else, and he alone had done no wrong. See, when we suffer, we've done wrong. We are part of the problem. But he suffered for wrongs that he did not do. But there is no resentment in him toward God, or the father, or toward us, who are the cause of his sufferings.
How he loved the father. How beautiful his life in the flesh was. We beheld his glory as of the only begotten of the father, full of grace and truth. How far he went in his love, all the way to the cross to save us, that we might be restored to God.
If only we would be like him, to have such love, to have such grace, to have such a commitment to our glorious father in heaven. And to him, what a grand thing that would be. You need to come to him for mercy.
You need to own up to your sin, in particular to resentment and defiance as much as it is in you. It's always ultimately against God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You must accept the justice of our sufferings here from God's hand.
You can pray for relief, but you must not charge God with doing wrong. He never has. You deserve much worse than you've ever seen in this world. So be ashamed of your resentment, repent of it, and forsake it.
You also need to come to Jesus for strength, to respond to him when you have been wronged, to respond to the Lord. Perhaps some of you have been struggling with resentment about what others did to you even years ago.
Maybe you've been struggling for years with that. You cannot accept that God sent that injustice. You need to accept that from God, that was exactly just what he did. Yes, the individual was unjust, and God will deal with the wrong that they did to you, but you are resentful because you're accusing God of doing wrong.
Or perhaps you deny that he sent that to you, which is even worse. Some people deny the sovereignty of God, and they say, oh, no, I couldn't even accept that God did anything like that, what happened to me.
That's even worse, because you're saying that God couldn't be so bad as to do what he actually did. You see how bad that is? It's like the true God could never do anything so bad to me. That's a distorted perspective.
Ask Jesus to help you, pray to him. He's merciful, he will forgive you for your treason against him, for your treason against God. Come and ask, plead for his mercy, and ask him for grace that you can respond to God the way he has called you to respond.
These are not easy things, but his grace is sufficient. He will help you to respond to God. You may have to labor, you may have to struggle over years to do that, but do not go on with resentment and defiance.
When you come and ask for forgiveness, even if you're still not quite straightened out yet, he will completely forgive you, and he'll help you to work through that if you ask him to do it. Don't go around with bitterness and resentment.
There is no reason to do that. Come to God with gladness and recognize that he is holy and just and good, gracious and loving, wise and true, holy and right, always right. Please stand and let's call on his name.
Oh, Lord, our God, Lord, our Lord, how excellent is your name in all the earth. You are a righteous and holy God. You are a God who does no injustice whatsoever. We are the ones who committed treason against you.
Our whole human race is a part of that treason. We carry it within us, Lord. It is something that is a part of us. We are resentful and defiant toward you. We were resentful because of the fruit that you told us we couldn't eat, and we justified our defiance.
And Lord, we are so twisted and corrupt, and we've continued in that. And we pray, oh Lord, that you would have mercy upon us, Lord, for you are a merciful God, and you have shown your mercy by sending Jesus to die for treasonous, rebellious sinners we are.
And we thank you and praise you that he bore the pains of hell for us on the cross. He was punished for our iniquities and raised for our justification. You accepted his sacrifice. You raised him from the dead and pronounced that all sins are dealt with through our Lord Jesus Christ, that if we come to him and we repent of our sins, that he will forgive us, that he has paid the penalty of our sins, and that atonement has been made.
We pray, oh Lord, that we would step into that blessing, and we pray, oh Lord, that we would live in that blessing, and that you would give us grace, because we find, Lord, treason, resentment, defiance, it's always wanting to well up in our hearts.
We always think that you have done wrong to us, and we have a tendency to always think that, and we're tempted to think that, and we pray that you would deliver us from these thoughts, that we would recoil when those thoughts come to us, when those temptations come to us, and Father, that we would begin to look at that the way we would look at any other heinous sin.
We pray, oh Lord, for your mercy to us, because you have been so very patient with us in these things as we labor along, and we think about the Apostle Paul and how he talked about this, and the sin that was in him that he found was there all the time, and that he prayed and said, who will deliver me from this body of death?
And then he gave thanks that it was you, it was the Lord Jesus Christ, who would deliver him from his body of death, and that there is no condemnation in Jesus Christ to those who have trusted in him for salvation, and that truly, you transform our hearts and change us so that we can grow up to be more and more like Jesus Christ.
Oh, Father, do your work in us, have mercy on us, and help us, we pray, in Jesus' name, amen.
Let's sing a song about that. Psalm 130a, 130a, come to the table.
How glad we should be to have a Savior like Jesus. For treasonous sinners, he welcomes treasonous sinners. He says, come to me, all you that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. He's a Savior that delights to save.
He came for that very purpose, and this table testifies of that to us, as we have the bread that represents his body that was broken, his body that he took to be sacrificed on the cross, and the wine represents his blood that was shed for the remission of our sins, to bring forgiveness, to pay the penalty of our sin.
He bore our transgressions. There was no resentment in him in having been called to do that by his Father. He came here, and he did that freely, and he did it in love to the Father and in love to us. And he gives us this table where he says that this was done for you.
This was done so that you could be reconciled to me, to me and my Father and the Holy Spirit, that we are the ones who reconcile you. Jesus paid the penalty on the cross. The Holy Spirit transforms and renews our hearts so that we can serve God, and one day, without any resentment and any treason whatsoever in us, any defiance whatsoever, when we are perfected in glory, how we look forward to that when we can dwell with our God in all eternity in glory and enjoy the fellowship of one another without sin, enjoy fellowship with our God.
Truly, we have much to be grateful for. This is a table for thanksgiving. This is a table for rejoicing. This is a table for coming and feeding upon Christ because we so need him. We need him so desperately to deal with those things that are wrong and dark in our hearts in order that we might grow and we might become more like him.
He says, my body given for you, my blood shed for the remission of your sins, not only for the forgiveness you see, but to nourish us that we may grow up to be more and more what he has called us to be.
Let's ask him to, well, first let me read the words of institution from Matthew. And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it and gave it to his disciples and said, take, eat, this is my body.
Then he took the cup and gave thanks and gave it to them saying, drink from it all of you, for this is my blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until the day when I drink it new with you and my father's kingdom.
So you can come to this table if you are a member in good standing and you are committed to the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember, some church doesn't have to be this one in good standing and that you're seeking the Lord, come to him and partake with us.
Let's ask him then to meet with us and bless us. Well, Lord our God, we come to you with humility, confessing that we are great sinners, oh Lord. But we come also with gladness, confessing that you are a great savior and that you have done these things to save us.
What is displayed to us here, that your son was given to be crucified. And we see here that he is the sacrifice. He is the lamb of God that was sent to take away the sin of the world. And he did that and you accepted his sacrifice.
We praise you, Lord Jesus, for what you have done. You are the king of glory. You are the king of kings and the Lord of lords. You are the son of man who is now exalted to sit at the right hand of your father.
And we praise you that we are able to serve you, oh Lord, and that you are a gracious king who helps us and understands our infirmities and who pardons our sins as we still commit them and still have them in us that we don't even see sometimes.
We pray, oh Lord, that you would help us to grow, help us to be nourished up in the calling that you have given to us as your people, that we would become more and more full of our God and full of his salvation.
Oh Father, please bless us. Lord Jesus, bless us. Holy Spirit, work in us. Do what only you can do. We can't change our own heart. You can change us. Our eyes are on you. Open our eyes to see who you are more and more clearly and help us, Lord, to delight in your commandments and in your way and to walk in them and to be free of those things, Lord, that are sinful and ugly and dark.
Oh Lord, deliver us especially from resentment and defiance that we may be truly broken before you, Lord, to serve you in humility and tenderness. Thank you for your receiving of us, oh Lord. Give us encouragement.
Give us joy and refreshment at this table. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. You may eat and drink as soon as the tray is passed to you and then we'll give thanks. According to the holy institution, command an example of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
I take this bread and having blessed it, break it and give it to you. Take, eat, this is the body of Christ which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of him. At that time, Jesus said, I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes.
Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in your sight. All things have been delivered to me by my Father and no one knows the Son except the Father, nor does anyone know the Father except the Son and the one to whom the Son reveals, wills to reveal him.
Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
According to the institution, command an example of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I also take this cup and give it to you. This cup is the new covenant in the blood of Jesus Christ, which was shed for the remission of the sins of many.
Drink from it, all of you who are trusting in him. Thus says the Lord God, I will gather you from the peoples, assemble you from the countries where you have been scattered and I will give you the land of Israel.
They will go there and they will take away all its detestable things and all its abominations from there. Then I will give them one heart and I will put a new spirit within them and take the stony heart out of their flesh and give them a heart of flesh that they may walk in my statutes and keep my judgments and do them and they shall be my people and I will be their God.
How good it is to hear hard things about ourselves and good things about our Savior. Let's worship him, singing Psalm 91b. Psalm 91b.
We ask you to give us guidance in our work to serve your kingdom here on earth. We pray that you help the true outreach and that you give us wisdom in our plan there. All of our efforts outside of worship.
We pray that you draw us closer together as a congregation of your people, that we find ways to help each other and be there for one another. We pray your blessing upon the food we're about to share. And we ask for your blessing as well on our tithes and offerings.
We pray that you give us wisdom in their use. In the precious name of your Son, Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen. Amen.
People of God, receive now the blessing of the Lord our God. Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. To God our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.