Sermon: Right Lament

This morning we're looking at second Samuel verses 17 through 27.

This is a little bit of a different passage, so let me do a little introduction before, uh, I read it for us this morning. You know, we've spent a whole month in January looking at the idea of gratitude, and we've said, look, a Christian is to live a life of gratitude before God. We always have reason to give thanks and, and part of having a life that is lived in gratitude is that you and I should experience and we should express joy, that fruit of the spirit,

there should be, should be a joy filled Christian life. And so we could say it this way, we'd say it's, it's not an oxymoron to speak about the happy Christian. That's not an oxymoron. But living a gratitude filled life, living a joy filled life, being a happy Christian does not mean that we don't grieve the things that we experience, the loss, the suffering, the trials, the tribulations of this life as happy Christian is not an oxymoron.

So lamenting Christian is not an oxymoron. In our text this morning, we see a lament. What is a lament? Well, lament is not some kind of a spontaneous kind of emotional response. Uh, Dale Ralph Davis said it, well, he called it an expression of thoughtful grief. It's a vehicle for both the mind and the emotions as well as the emotions to express that grief. And David, in our text morning as we read through it, he, he gives us a lament

and he has reason to lament because the pains of the world have come and they've camped out on his doorstep. We remember from last week that we saw at the beginning of two Samuel that an amalekite has come to David and come to his mighty men. And he has come with a report from the battlefield. And the report is this, Saul, the first king of Israel, Saul son, Jonathan, and many Israelites have fallen on the field of battle

before the Philistines, and they have been defeated. And David, along with his men, we saw in verse 12 that their response to this last week was they mourned, they wept, they fasted in response. And in our text this morning, we now have this kind of formal grieving, this lament that David offers in response and that he ask to be recorded for the people. And so we are going to read that this morning and work our way through it.

Let me pray for us before we open God's word.

Our Father, we do pray this morning that you would speak to us in your word and we pray that your spirit and only the way that he can would apply it to our hearts, and that Christ himself will be magnified and that we would find that we are being conformed to his likeness. And we pray all of us in the strong name of our savior. Amen. This morning, two Samuel chapter one, verses 17 through 27. This is the holy er, sufficient word of God.

And David lamented with this lamentation over Saul and Jonathan, his son, and he said, it should be taught to the people of Judah. Behold, it is written in the book of Jay, Shar. He said, your glory of Israel is slain on your high places. How the mighty have fallen. Tell it not. And gaff publish it not in the streets of Eschelon, lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoice lest the daughters of the uncircumcised exalt you.

Mountains of gilboa let there be no dew or reign upon you, nor fields of offerings for there. The shield of the mighty was defiled, the shield of soul not anointed with oil from the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty. The bow of Jonathan turned not back, and the sword of soul returned not empty. Soul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely in life and in death, they were not divided. They were swifter than eagles.

They were stronger than lions. New daughters of Israel weep over soul who clothed you, luxuriously in Scarlet, who put ornaments of gold on your apparel, how the mighty have fallen in the midst of the battle. Jonathan lies slain on your high places. I'm distressed for you. My brother Jonathan, very pleasant. Have you been to me? Your love to me was extraordinary surpassing the love of women, how the mighty have fallen,

and the weapons of war perished. Well, the grass withers and the flower fades. The word of God is forever. Thanks. Speak to God. Amen.

I see a passage like this. And one of the thoughts that has to go through your head is, is why, why is this here? We've entered into the narrative of Second Samuel and David rising to the throne, and we're going to walk through his rule over the nation of Israel. Well, why have this lament here at the very beginning? And why does he ask that it be recorded? And why does he have it taught to his people? And this morning, I want to suggest to you as we walk

through this lament that there are four reasons that we can tease out of it. The first is that there was a corporate reason. There was a corporate reason for recording this lament. The nation as a whole needed a song to sing together. Why? Well, he begins verse 19, your glory. Oh, Israel is slain on your high places. How the mighty have fallen. This was a corporate loss of the entire nation. This was no slight thing. It was not small.

David is not using hyperbole here. He's not being poetic. He's not offering flattery. This is a true statement. Saul was a man of stature, both physically and also in position positionally, but physically, as we talked about last week, he was head and shoulders above all the rest of the men of Israel. He stood tall. He had strength, he had gravitas about him. He is one of the few people in the Bible that is called handsome.

He's handsome. There was a, a GQ in Israel. He would've been Mr. April, may in June. But not just that, he, he was positionally the king of Israel. And so he wouldn't have only been on the quarter of gentleman's quarterly, he would've been on the cover of time and he would've been on the cover of Newsweek. That's who he was. This is no small loss that they have experienced. They, they needed to sing together. And he moves into that grief in verses 20

and 21, that they, they need to understand corporately what they have lost. What, what an awful event this was. It's implied in verse 20, that these Philistines, whom he calls the uncircumcised, that they are the gentiles. That they are the pagans.

He says they will exalt at the defeat of Israel. And what is implied is that they see in this victory, and they will interpret this victory not just as their nation defeating the nation of Israel, but they will view it as their God. Dagon defeating the true God, the living God. Yahweh. This is not just a national loss. This is a religious loss. And he wants to give them voice. He wants to give them a song they can sing.

He could see it in his mind's eye. He speaks about it there in verse 20. The Philistines rejoicing in their streets. You see them parading around in the streets of gaff and the streets of Ashkelon. You've seen pictures of this and pictures from May 8th, 1945 when there are millions of people in the streets from San Francisco to New York, to London, to Paris, to Warsaw, to Auckland, New Zealand. They, they're all in the streets and they're rejoicing,

but you don't see rejoicing in the streets of Hamburg and Dresden and Berlin. Why? Because it's a ve day, it's victory in Europe day, Germany has just surrendered unconditionally surrendered to the allied powers. And the European Theater of World War II has come to a close. And so in the nations where they are victorious, there's marching and triumph and, and tears of joy in the streets and in Berlin and in Hamburg and in Dresden, there's just lament,

there's sorrow for what was lost.

The people of God needed to corporately lament.

There are times that we as the church need to do this together.

We need that song in our mouths together. I don't know if you remember this, but this week is an important anniversary. Uh, it was three years ago.

I still have trouble, uh, driving past the pavilion on Michigan State's campus because that's where I spent that night. And it's a night that'll be etched in my mind, I think till the day I die three years ago, where we had a murderer go on campus and take the lives of four students.

But you know, what's also etched in my mind is the following night where there were a whole bunch of you students. This whole room was packed of students. And we cried together. We sang lament together,

and then we went out here in the fellowship hall and we ate together.

There's reasons to corporately lament.

How did this happen to Israel? How did they fall from such heights? In verses 22 and 23, David reminds the nation of the, the great prowess and the great victories that Saul and Jonathan rocked for the nation. There. There was a time when Saul and when Jonathan conquered their foes and, and destroyed their foes, then it was not the Philistines rejoicing, it was the Israelites rejoicing. They had moved, he says swifter than eagles.

They had strength of lines. They, they knew victory, they knew prosperity as he alludes to in verse 24 with the women, they, they were a adorned with gold and they were adorned with scarlet because of all these victories and all of these possessions that they would bring back to the nation. So what happened?

Well, that's the second reason for the lament. It's a warning. There's a corporate reason for the lament. And now there's a warning. All of this happened and he's giving this kind of this, this juxtaposition. This is what it was like. And this is now what it is because he wants them to know that there's been a break in between. And what was that break? It was soul's sin. And Saul's sin led to Israel's shame. They were to sing. And as they were singing together,

corporately, there was a, a kind of warning to one another. Like Paul was saying, Colossians three, where we sing songs and hymns and spiritual songs in one another. We're admonishing one another. We're exhorting one another. And as they're singing this lament, they're reminding one another of the great effects of sin.

Because sin never keeps within its bounds, has great consequences. Not only for me, but for those around me. Those that are after me, those that are downstream from me, man that looks at pornography on the internet. He's not just doing damage to himself. He, he does it to the woman that he is looking at. He does it to his wife or his future wife, or he does it to his friends that find out about this and, and oh, it, it taints their, their own view.

Or maybe even encourage them to think that this is something they can enjoy. The seminary professor that begins to teach heterodoxy or begins to wander into things that are unorthodox and teaches those to his students, those students then go on to teach it to their congregations and and their ministerial peers. And before you know it, a church has changed and a community has changed. An entire denomination can be changed.

An entire country can be changed.

Sin has long tentacles. It never sits idle. It's like that gremlin that you try and sedate and keep in a cage. You can't, it can't be kept.

It always spreads. It always demands more. It can't be satiated. It can only be killed. You have to kill it at the root.

And they're given the song as a warning, what heights we've fallen from. We were conquering all of our enemies. What changed?

So sin,

there's a corporate reason. There's a warning reason. Third, there is, there are political reasons for recording this. Lament political in the best sense of the word. Remember Paul, I mean, Saul has pursued David and he has chased him as we spoke about last week. And he will chase him into the wilderness. He'll seek to put him to death, and he will even chase him into other countries, into foreign countries. He will have to leave Judah.

And now David publishes this lament of his death. And by doing so, he's demonstrating to the nation his identification with them. David never left Israel. He never aligned himself against her. He was part and parcel of her. And the nation is grieving the loss of its first king. And and David understands his pain. He is experiencing it himself. And so he doesn't disparage. Paul notice that nowhere in this lament though,

he puts this, this showing the, the distinction between what they were and what they are. He never mentioned soul's sin. He doesn't do that, nor does he malign his name. Nor does he give into resentment and say, well, Saul had it coming. No, he celebrates what he can celebrate about, about Saul. And he grieves with the people.

It's beautiful imagery that he provides of these two great warriors. What great warriors they were verses 22 and 23, Jonathan, a, a master with a bow, soul, a master with the sword. He calls them beloved and lovely in verse 23, that they're beloved by the people and they're, and they're lovely in the service of God. David understands and he shows himself to be a true shepherd of the people. A true pastor of the people he identifies with them

had a mentor who was called by a, a church to follow. A pastor who started that church was the founding pastor of that church. And when the founding chur pastor was on his way out and the new pastor, my mentor was on his way in, they were having a conversation. And the founding PO pastor said to my mentor, he said, you, you be careful with my daughter. And that my mentor was taking over for him, said, she's not your daughter, she's more like your wife.

And he said, Jason, he said the church was going to grieve the founding pastor, leaving like a wife grieves the loss of her husband. And he said, no matter how much they might be drawn to me as their new pastor, they would, they would feel like they were cheating on him if they showed too much affection to me too soon. And he said, so I had to be patient. And I always spoke well of him no matter what. And he said, and over time they would begin to see

that they could have affection for me. And it didn't mean that they stopped having affection for him.

It's an applicable lesson for new pastor, a new boss, a new husband marrying a, a widow, a new stepmom with children, a new king. And David understands this as poor as a king, as Saul was, he was still the first king. And there were still things to celebrate. He won many battles. He led them, he gave them confidence. And so David is happy and to lament his death, if you can say it that way.

But finally, and most importantly, there was a personal reason David had it recorded because he wanted the people of Judah to personally learn this crying song. And David himself had this song in his heart and it was the song that was on his lips. Why? Because the life of faith at times needs such a song. There's loss or pains, there's grief in this life.

There's one thing that pastoring has taught me beyond anything else, is that every single person is suffering. Every single person.

There's no one in this room that's not suffering. Now, there are different degrees of suffering in this room,

but for everyone, what they are suffering

feels like inordinate suffering and is a lot of suffering.

There are things to grieve

Personally. There is more than enough reason to lament in this life. And David's going to voice, give voice to it here on Sundays. There, there are times that John and I, when we're putting together the service that we will put in a song of lament and, and there's a reason for that. It's because when we gather, it's not just to uplift the spirit. It's not just to give thanksgiving. It's not just to give praise that there is also time

that you and I need that lament song in our mouths because that's what we're experiencing.

There's sorrow and you need voice for it.

David is in incredible pain, personal pain. And it reaches, its a apex in the anguish that he expresses in verse 26, it is a, a beautiful verse. That's a verse that some have tried to corrupt over the years. They've turned it into a wax nose to try and make a case for homosexuality being sanctioned by the scriptures. And that is just absurd, absurd.

There's no description of homoerotic Lo fear. He says, I'm distressed for you. My brother Jonathan, very pleasant. Have you been to me? Your love to me was extraordinary surpassing the love of women. What is this? This is a description of true friendship, of godward friendship, of kingdom centered friendship of God focused and God sealed friendship. Jonathan was devoted to David as a kingdom friend. They were focused on God together.

If you've had a friendship like that then, then you can understand this.

His friendship was simply amazing and just refreshing to David want you remember, Jonathan is second in line to the throne. He is the prince of Israel. The crown is his for the taking. Except it isn't because God promised it to David.

And so if anybody shouldn't be the friend of David, surely it is Jonathan. But Jonathan will go to David in one Samuel 23 and he'll say, you will be king of Israel and I will be second to you. There's no reluctance.

There's no hesitation on his part. And and these aren't mere words by Jonathan. No, this is attended to with action. He lives this way with David. He is loyal to David, kingdom centered friendship. And this is why David can say your love to me was extraordinary surpassing the love of women. And if you've had a Christian friend like this, you can understand that

not a friendship centered upon sports or politics or recreation or food or complaining or even children or vocation,

but a true friendship that's centered upon the kingdom that's centered upon Christ, that walks by the spirit together where your friendship, your conversations are littered with speaking about Christ. Where you find yourselves often in conversation just stopping because they're populated with prayer. You just pray together where you're encouraging one another in your pursuit of Christ, where you're helping one another

to hope in Christ where you're challenging one another, to grow in Christ

just true pilgrims on the road together.

Together. That's what David had with Jonathan.

And he just lost it.

He's got reason for lament.

There are times to lament or to grieve that isn't unchristian.

A few closing thoughts about grief. First grief is real. Grief is real. There are those who try to live in this world like the pains and the sorrows and the things of this world shouldn't affect you as a Christian should live the unemotional life. You should be like a Vulcan. Listen, Vulcans aren't humans. They're not even real. You're human. You're human.

BB Warfield wrote a famous essay called The Emotional Life of our Lord. And it's worth your time reading. You can go find it on the internet. It's out there everywhere. Take you 20 minutes to read. But what he is pointing out is that Christ is the perfect human and Christ experienced grief. Listen to these few sentences from his essay where he addresses grief. He says, the tears which wet his cheeks. When looking upon the uncontrolled grief of Mary

and her companions, he advanced with heart swelling with indignation at the outrage of death to the conquest of the destroyer, John 1135, where distinctly tears of sympathy even more clearly his own unrestrained, wailing over Jerusalem. And its stubborn unbelief was the expression of the most poignant pity, oh that thou had known in the day, even thou, the things which belong into peace. Luke 1941, the sight of suffering drew tears from his eyes.

Obstinate, unbelief convulsed him with uncontrollable grief. Grief is real. It's real because grief is human.

It means that second grief is needed. It's needed. As Matthew Henry said of this text, he said, the more we love, the more we grieve. If you truly value a thing,

then when you lose that thing which you value, you suffer a true loss. And of what is of greater value than that what you love. So if you love a thing and then you lose that thing, it's right. It's a right response to have grief.

It's actually needed. We grieve because we love.

Third grief is deep. It's deep. It drips off the page here with David's lament.

He speaks about Jonathan Just Drips with how deep it is,

so much so that he needs to record it. You know, sadness, we will often talk about that. And sadness tends to be surface level. I, I'm sad that I go to the grocery store and they don't have my cereal on the shelf or I'm sad that, uh, we were planning a picnic today and it got snowed out. I'm sad. It comes, it goes

Grief Doesn't. Grief goes deep. It's not a thing that is here for a split moment. And then all of a sudden it, it disappears. It it, it provides a kind of ache. Inwardly, in grief, you often feel it in your, your bones. We say Just hurts.

Just hurts.

It's an odd thing because it's a, a wound deep within. And so others can't always see it. And so they often miss it and it often gets forgotten or it gets looked passed and yet you feel It. You know, if a, if a man in our congregation, let's call him John, and John is in a auto accident and he has a leg that is trapped in the auto accident and he loses that leg.

Uh, you go and visit him in the hospital, you would say, well, last week John had a leg this week he doesn't have a leg. He had two. Now he's got one. Oh, John, what loss? And then the weeks go by and, and you go to visit John and you see him. He is now being pushed in a wheelchair down the hospital holes. And you see him with just one leg propped up and the other is a stump with bandages on it. And oh John. And then the months go by

and finally he can make it back here. And you see him come in on the crutches into the building and into the sanctuary and he comes down the aisle on the crutches with one leg. And every time you see John, you can't help. But oh man, I feel bad for the suffering. John just Went through. And I think if John walked in this room, there would all be all kinds of little prayers that are going up in the room for John. Oh Lord, be with John.

It's hard about grief and loss is is that it's inward

and people don't see it or they forget about it or they look past it.

And you walk into the room and no one knows. No one remembers.

But it hurts. And it can be just as agonizing, if not more agonizing than losing your leg can stick with you just as long.

So be sensitive to the pains around you.

'cause everybody's in pain. It's just degrees. Have eyes for it.

Third grief is often long. It's often long. Sometimes it lasts for life. Some pains we experience we never quite get over. But here's the reality. Some pains in life you shouldn't get over.

I've told many of you this that I've sat with that are going through deep sorrows, um, because it's an illustration that often goes through my mind. And so I've shared it way too often. But I think about it. So, you know, when when you suffer some loss, it it, it, it's like a, a wound to the arm. It's a, it's a deep wound. And over time what happens is, is that it, it begins to scab over and as it scabs over, it just becomes a little less sensitive to the touch.

But then all of a sudden some something brushes up against it and oh, oh, that hurts.

And it all comes flooding back.

It can be some song on the radio, it can be some memory. It can be seeing a family in the park and ah, that hurts.

'cause it can be long, it can be a lifetime of grief

and you've been through some great losses. You gotta be patient and kind with yourself.

It just may stick with you. That's okay.

It's actually, um, part of the way that we acknowledge that this world, world is not our home.

For those of you that haven't ever really suffered deep grief and encourage you, be kind and patient with those around you,

the grief may be something that they have for life and that's not wrong.

That leads to our final point. Grief does come to an end. Grief ends and it ends because we have a friend who has triumphed and overcome an elder brother who overcome all that causes the sufferings and the pains of this life. He's overcome them all.

There will be a day when he will wipe away every tear from our eyes. And death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning. No crying nor pain anymore. For the former things have passed away. Grief has an expiration date. It stops for the Christian

lament will no longer have a place for the Christian. Paul reminds the Corinthians I, and I think he's reminding himself of this when he says this. He says, for this light, momentary affliction is preparing for us. And he eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, beyond all comparison.

I've watched a funny video clip multiple times. There's an Italian chef on a morning show, a British morning show, and he is, he's making pasta for them. And like any Italian chef, he is very serious about his pasta. And he makes this pasta for them. And then they taste the pasta. And then one of the morning show personality says to the other morning, show personality. You know, if it had a little ham in it, it would be like a British carbon era.

And you watch the Italian chef just raise his head. And the other morning show host, uh, is reeled in by the first one who says, don't you agree? And that morning, show host doesn't know what to do. And sheepishly looks at the Italian chef and puts his head down and says Uhhuh. And then the Italian chef explodes and he says, if my grandma had wheels, she would be a bicycle. They're two different recipes. You can't compare them

beyond comparison.

Our grief and our glory are beyond comparison. Pauls in heaven. If someone compared our earthly sufferings or our heavenly reward, I think we'd be more outraged than an Italian pasta chef. Our sufferings won't compare to our sight of him. Our grief won't compare to our glory. The song of lament that we sing will be replaced with the song of joy for all the eternity. And they can't be compared.

And that's everlasting. It's just slight momentary affliction for the time. But while we are here, it is proper and right that we would give voice to that slight momentary affliction. And there is a right place for lament in the Christian life.

But as promises someday it ends and you no longer lament, but just rejoice.

It's a promise of your savior. Lamentation has an expiration day. Let's pray together.

Our Father, we are thankful you are a God who meets us in the midst of our sorrows.

The scriptures speak to us in every portion of life and even put a song in our mouth when it seems that we are gripped by the sorrows of this world. But we are equally thankful that you are a God who is triumphed over all of your and our enemies. So that one day we shall do nothing but cease to rejoice before your throne no longer afflicted, no longer grieving, no longer crying. Thank you for being such a God. We pray all of this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.