Sermon: The Way of the King

Take a copy of God's word this morning. If you want to, you can grab a few Bible. We're gonna turn open to Second Samuel chapter five this morning as we continue our way through that book. It's on page 2 5 7 in the pew Bible 2, 5 7

this morning. Second Samuel chapter five In the first 16 verses of chapter five,

and before we open God's word together this morning, uh, let me pray for us and let's ask for the Lord's blessing of His word.

Our Father, we do pray this morning that you would quiet minds, that you would quiet hearts. You would quiet souls

because we want them void of any activity but so that they might be they fertile soil for your word. You pray that you would seize our mind with the truth of your word, that you would grip our hearts with the truth of your word, that you would stir our souls with the truth of your word and that we would leave knowing that we have heard from the sovereign God of heaven and earth and you've been with us today and we have had the delight of being with you

and we pray all of this in the strong name of Christ, the living Word, his name, amen. Two Samuel chapter five, verses one through 16. This is a holy and err sufficient word of God. Then all the tribes of Israel came to David as Hebron and said, behold, we are your bone and flesh. In times past when Saul was king over us, it was you who led out and brought in Israel. And the Lord said to you, you shall be my shepherd, shepherd

of my people Israel and shall be prince over Israel. So all the elders of Israel came to the king at he and King David made a covenant with him at he before the Lord and they anointed David King over Israel. David was 30 years old when he began to reign and he reigned 40 years at Hebron. He reigned over Judah seven years and six months and at Jerusalem he reigned over all Israel and Judah 33 years. And the king and his men went

to Jerusalem against the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land who said to David, you will not come in here but the blind and the lame will ward you off thinking David cannot come in here. Nevertheless, David took the stronghold of Zion, that is the city of David. And David said on that day, whoever would strike the Jebusites, let them get up the water shaft to attack the lame and the blind who are hated by David's soul.

Therefore, it is said the blind and the lame shall not come into the house. And David lived in the stronghold and called it the city of David. And David built the city all around from the Milo inward and David became greater and greater for the Lord. The God of hose was with him and Hiram king of tires sent messengers to David and cedar trees, also carpenters and masons who built David A. House. And David knew that the Lord had established him king over

Israel and that he had exalted his kingdom for the sake of his people. Israel and David took more concubines and wives from Jerusalem after he came from Hebrew and more sons and daughters were born to David. And these are the names of those who were born to him in Jerusalem, ua, shbab, Nathan Solomon, IBOR, Elihu, NEFE, gefi, Eli Shama, eia and Ella, the grass withers and the flower fades. The word of God is forever. Thanks. Speak to God. Amen.

This morning what I want to do is build upon what we considered together last week and maybe look at it in just a little bit of a different light as we continue our way through Second Samuel this morning, as we've spoken about the last couple of weeks, especially last week and you probably don't need a reminder this morning, is that we live in quite a troubled world. It doesn't take much looking around, it doesn't wouldn't take much.

I could call upon every single person in this room and you could all testify to different troubles, to different trials, to different tragedies in your life, to discouragement, to to disease, to death, to hatred, to envy, to gossip, to slander and on. We could go and everyone has to respond to that. We all do. Every single one of us in this room, there is a way that we respond to this. There is something that we are hoping in in the midst

of a trouble world. My question for you this morning is what is it that you are hoping in? What are you hoping in

Yuval Noah Harri. I think it's how you say his name, the New York Times bestselling author. He has written a number of books that are on the New York Times bestselling list over the last decade or so and one of his books, homo de was published in 2017 and in that he wrote this at the dawn of the millennium, humanity wakes up to an amazing realization. Most people rarely think about it, but in the last few decades we have managed

to reign in famine, plague and war. Of course, these problems have not been completely solved, but they've been transformed from incomprehensible and uncontrollable forces of nature into manageable challenges. We don't need to pray to any God or saint to rescue us from them. We know quite well what needs to be done in order to prevent famine, plague and war and we usually succeed in doing it.

His claim in the book bestselling book, New York Times bestseller book was that we no longer need God because Homo Deus humanity has become God.

We've solved famine, we've solved war, we've solved plagues.

He wrote that in 2017. I wonder what he was thinking in 2020.

Our first point this morning is that you are to hope in God, hope in God. Second this morning what I want to do is look at the fact that hope in God is rewarded. And finally the problem with hoping in mere man as that author has done so first hope in God, our passage begins with quite a day. It's a day that David has waited for for a long period of time. We are told at the very beginning of passage that all of the leaders of the 12 tribes of Israel,

they have finally gathered together and they are all gathering together at Hebron before David and they're all kneeling before David as king. And they give three reasons for their submission to David as king. One, he was their kindred. They say verse one, behold we are your bone and flesh. Two, he had led Israel successfully in battle. They say when Saul was king over us, it was you who let out and brought in Israel and he had established victories.

Three. The third reason that they give is the Lord's promise to David was known by them. Again, it's a little shocking if you don't know men, but they know that God has promised this throne to David. He has promised that he would enthone him. They say, the Lord said to you, you shall be shepherd of my people Israel and you shall be prince over Israel. And so finally as if they could stand against God, they relent and they're now all bowing the need

king David, you're our king will follow you.

David. Contrary to those 11 tribes that rebelled against him, always knew their folly, he knew that he would be king. He knew that he would reign and he trusted God to bring this to fruition. He set his hope in God through all the suffering that he endured. If you think back again with me over all of those years from the moment that he was anointed as that ruddy little boy that we were told that was tending sheep for his father.

From that moment on he faces persecution and slander and hatred. He is driven from his home. He is forced to another country. He is suffering constantly. And in the midst of all of that, he hoped in God,

he knew God would quote, make him shepherd of my people. Now why did he have such hope? Why did he hope in God this way? Well, let's see if we can sort through this a little bit. Throughout the scriptures, the leaders of God's people are explicitly and implicitly, often referred to as David is referred to here as shepherds. And that shouldn't surprise you because leaders throughout the scriptures, leaders of God's people are simply representing God to his people.

And the responsibility of leaders as they represent God to his people is that they're to protect, they're to provide and they are to love the people of God. And shepherds, protect, provide and love the sheep that are under their care. And as leaders of God's people, they're to represent God in this way because God is ultimately the great shepherd of his people. He's the true shepherd of his people. And that's why you see

that refrain throughout the scriptures regarding God. So think about the Psalms, the psalmist says this, come let us bow down and worship. Let us kneel before the Lord our maker, for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care. When Paul meets the elders in Ephesus of Ephesus out in Acts 20 on that beach and he is departing from them and he knows this is the last time that he shall see them

before he goes off to his martyrdom in Rome, he says to these elders, he says to them, pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseer shepherds to care for the church of God. As one theologian said, any shepherd leading Israel is a steward of the community purchased by Yahweh in the Exodus. Or we could say it this way. Any shepherd leading the church is a steward

of the community purchased by Christ upon the crawls. That's just fact. And David knows it that a leader among the people of God, whether he is a king or he is a husband, or whether he is a father, whether he is a mother or she's a mother, whether he is an elder, whether he is a pastor, that he is simply a steward in the community purchased by God. It's God himself who is the great shepherd of the sheep.

And David knew this. He knew God to be his shepherd. He knew that. And thus it was in God that David placed his hope.

It's David that will write Psalm 20, some trust in chariots and some trust in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord or God. They collapse and fall, but we rise and stand upright. It's hope that is well placed

hope in God.

Now sometimes as you and I hope in God we will find that it seems like his promises are very slow in being fulfilled. It seems like, oh maybe, maybe he's forgotten about this promise. Maybe he's forgotten about me maybe, but he knows what and he knows when and he knows how we need more than we do. You think about David, this promise has been so slow in coming. He was anointed as a small boy and he is gone through all of these years

of misery and heartache. It seems like God, you have forgotten about this promise and David continues to hope. He knows it will be fulfilled.

In fact, it's a promise that I would argue predates David. It's not just he that's waited, it's all of the nation of Israel has waited for the this. He will as we'll see in this chapter, he will go on to conquer Jerusalem and as he conquers Jerusalem, you see the fulfillment of God's promises that go all the way back to Abraham. In Genesis 15, God, in that promise to Abraham says this, he says to your offspring, I give this land from the river

of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the cites, the cites, the cites, the Hittites, the parasites, the em, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the gsites. And finally the very last one that he mentions is the Jebusites. And here we are 400 years later and the Jebusites are still in the land. They occupy this city of Jerusalem that sits in the center of the land. But God had promised Abraham that Israel would have all

of this land, but they're the Jebusites sit. And so for 400 years they wait for the fulfillment of this promise. Abraham waited. Isaac waited. Jacob waited. David waited

and they kept hoping this is so much, but the Christian life just looks like the life of faith. You just keep Abraham set out not knowing where he was going. He's just plotting forward in faithfulness, just keeps going in hope. David, all those years think all of these enemies surrounding me, a lesser man, he would've been crushed but he was a man of hope in God. He just kept plotting just the next step of faith. Dunno what's over the horizon, next step of faith,

but hoping in God

what about this trial and this suffering and this problem has God forgotten me. John Newton once wrote I think one of the best statements along these lines. He said this, he said, everything is needful. That God sins nothing can be needful, that God withholds whatever it is,

you have a sovereign God that is worthy of hoping in. That's what David just keeps on going, hoping along the way. But here's what's key. It's not as if David is going along the way and plotting forward in faith and hope by himself. 'cause that's not the picture either. Abraham wasn't alone, David wasn't alone. You Christian aren't alone. Look what the writer says in verse 10. Why is it that David became greater and greater?

Why is it he's now established in the land? David became greater and greater for the Lord. The God of hosts was with him, was with him. And that made all the difference. And David understood this.

Do you understand that Christian,

it allows you to continue to hope no matter what comes, no matter how hard he's with me. I want you to listen to how David says it in Psalm 16. Now I just wanna read the psalm for you. I just want you to listen. David, Psalm 16, he says, preserve me, oh God, for in you I take refuge. I say to the Lord, you are my Lord. I have no good apart from you. As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones. In whom is all my delight.

The sorrows of those who run after another. God shall multiply their drink, drink offerings of blood. I will not pour out or take their name on my lips. The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup, you hold my lot. The lines have fallen from me in pleasant places. Indeed I have a beautiful inheritance. I bless the Lord who gives me counsel and the night also my heart instructs me. I've set the Lord always before me because he is at my right hand.

I shall not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad and my whole being rejoices, my flesh also dwells secure for you will not abandon my soul to she. Let your holy one see corruption. You make known to me the path of life in your presence there is fullness of joy at your right hand or pleasures forever more. David simply hopes in God

and he's convinced his soul. He says, I have no good apart from you. And he knows that he has all good with the Lord. He's got it all. No matter what life brings, he's got it all.

And that Psalm 16, he gets to this conclusion that he's in the Lord's presence and it leads him to say in verse five he says this, the Lord is my chosen portion of my cup. You hold my lot. The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places. Indeed I have a beautiful inheritance. God has me. I have God. He's my inheritance. Now what's fascinating about this is the context and you think about the context in relation to our passage here in two Samuel,

Israel has entered the land. And you'll remember when Israel entered into the land that God apportioned the land and he gave to each tribe the tribe of Judah. You have this land from this point to this point. The tribe of Jan. You have the the land from this point to this point. But there was one tribe of the 12 tribes he didn't give any land to. And that was the tribe of Levites who are the tribe of the priests. And God said to them in numbers 1820

that they were given no land because quote, I am your portion and your inheritance among the people of Israel. So do you understand what David is saying? He's king over Israel in all the land. He's got all the land. And he says, that's not my inheritance.

I have all because I have God. He's my inheritance. He's all that I need. He's with me. You make known to me the path of life in your presence. There is fullness of joy. Add your right hand. Our pleasures forevermore. He's got God, he's got true hope in the world.

What a gift David enjoyed. God was with him. What a gift in a world of nastiness.

And you know David, long to see your day, my day.

'cause we're on this side of God with us. Emmanuel, the son of God becomes flesh and comes into this world and takes upon himself humanity so that he can live a perfect life and die a perfect death and be buried and raised on the third grave day so that he can ascend to the right hand of the Father so that he can send the spirit to indwell us

in a very real way. God is more with us Christian in the room than he was with David with us.

Jesus said, I will never leave you nor forsake you. He's the one who protects and provides and loves. He says, I am the good shepherd. I know my own.

And the most famous as Psalm, Psalm 23, David begins that psalm and he says, the Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want, I shall not want. Here's the fact, the Lord is my shepherd. Implication I shall not want. That's perfect reasoning.

If the sovereign Lord of heaven and earth who lived and died for me rules and he's my shepherd, I shall not want anything, anything. He's with me.

Where's your hope?

What he has called us to, he will equip and sustain us for he knows us better than we know ourselves. He knew David. David hoped in him

every failing we experience, he planned every insufficiency, he covers every need he provides. He leads his people and we simply follow. He provides, we minister, he protects. We simply trust. He's our hope,

which leads to our second point. Hope in God is rewarded. Hope in God is rewarded.

David moves from Hebron down to what will eventually be called Jerusalem, which means city or foundation of peace. The city goes by different names. You see in our text that David Renames the city, the city of David. It is at times in the scriptures called Zion. It's called Salem. Here in this passage as well, it is called GBIs because it was the city of the Jebusites. It was far from Jerusalem, a city of peace, the foundations

of peace at this time because it is a fortress of the Jebusites and it's a fortress that sits in the the middle of the land that David is king over. And he cannot allow this fortress of these canaanites, these jebusites to sit in his backyard. He must conquer it.

But this was a mighty fortress. The Jebusites believed it was impregnable. You see that in the text in verse six that they say the blind and the lame could defend it from attackers because it was up on a precipice of a hill. And they had these large walls that surround the city on top of this hill. And they're saying, look, the blind in the lame could just roll down stones from here and destroy an army. But verse seven, nevertheless,

David took the stronghold of Zion. That is the city of David.

How did he take it? Well, the author gives us some of the details. For a fortress stand for a long time it would've had to have had access to water. And so the occupants of this city, the Jebusites, they created strategically a water shaft that ran into the city within the walls all around it. In fact, archeology over the last couple of hundred years has found this shaft and it's well documented. It was a tunnel that ran from the inside of the city

and it went down steeply at the beginning. And then it hit this kind of gradual leveling off until it hit another deep shaft that would go straight down and ran into a horizontal corridor that went down to the pools of Han. And there they could draw buckets of water and so somebody could lower a bucket down and they could draw water from that spring of Han. And David, having grown up in this area in Bethlehem, must have had some knowledge of this water shaft.

And so he challenges his men to ascend this water shaft or so it appears in one Chronicles 11, we get the little more of the story there. There we're told that David promised that whoever would lead the charge in this regard, that he would reward that person by making them the commander in chief of his army. And there we are told in Chronicles that Joab rose to the occasion. You remember Joe AB from last week and previous weeks, the uh, commander of David's army

that will kill Abner. And here he solidified his place as chief of David's army. We aren't sure exactly what he did. Was it that he led soldiers up that water shaft and he led them in behind the city walls and he surprised the garrison of that city by attacking them from within? Or did he just go to that water shaft and he cut off every single bucket that was being lowered. And so he dried them out. We don't know. But regardless, the city of Jerusalem was taken

and David was established as king in Israel was hope realized.

It is so clear. And the author wants us to know that it is so clear that David is now established as king and Israel is now in the land and has control of the land. That even we have these foreign kings that are recognizing David and recognizing his rule. And so the king of tire, who is no small entity, is sending forth famous cedar trees and CERs and masons to build a house for David. Because no doubt David is going to rain For a very

long time, David hoped in God and that hope was worded. Mark it down. God never fails his people, never.

Johan. Gerhard who was a pastor from the Reformation era said it this way. He said, David spent 10 years in exile, but 40 in his kingdom, which led him to say this. Here is prefigured the brevity of our suffering and the glory of eternity to follow. It's about a point in time when the saints are exercised by the crawls, but the mercies by which they're comforted are forever. And therefore, adversity in the morning is followed

by prosperity. In the evening we will know peace.

It's a promise to the Christian, you will know peace,

have a fixed hope and a sovereign God,

the son of God became man so that he could live a perfectly righteous life so that he could die an atoning death for sinners so that he would be buried so that he'd be raised on the third day. And by that resurrection, he shows his triumph over all yours and my enemies, all of them.

He ascended to the right hand of the Father and he reigns. Now they're simply being made a footstool beneath his feet.

And what's the picture in Revelation 21? You have this new city, Jerusalem, foundations of peace, city of peace that is descending from the heavens and settles upon the earth. And what is that new city, Jerusalem. It's the dwelling place of God with man. And what are we told is this new city of Jerusalem we're told it's a bride that has been adorned for her husband. What is that new city? Jerusalem. It's the church. It's the people of God

where he's dwelling in their midst forever more and there's ever lasting peace

cross then glory. That's always the way.

But it's just for a season that's for eternity.

And when we receive it, it's not some consolation prize for all that we've lost in this life. That's not what it is.

Rather, it's the fulfillment of all that we have desired. All your longings, all your desires, all your hopes realized, but more than realized, surpassed infinitely.

Why? All these trials, I feel like my life has been ripped away. Well so did David at times.

But as one author said, we can lose our lives, but we can never lose his love. You have your inheritance,

you have what matters. You have God. Jonathan Edwards said that the capturing of Jerusalem by David is one of the greatest pictures of our salvation. He said it this way. It was redeemed by David, the captain of the host of Israel, out of the hands of the jebus to be God's city, the holy place of his rest forever, where he would dwell. And so Christ, the captain of his people, salvation, redeems his church out of the hands of devils to be his holy

and beloved city forever.

Many of you have lost greatly this side of heaven.

But no matter what, the world tries to steal away and no matter what it does, steal away, there's one thing it can't take. There's one thing you cannot lose. That which eternally matters The Lord,

you are his. He is yours. Hope in God is rewarded eternally.

Finally, the problem with hoping in man, here's what happens. If you're not hoping in God, you're hoping in that man or that man or that man or this man or the imaginations or the workings of that man or the imaginations and workings of this man

and they will always fail. You always

remember that quote by Yuval Harri at the beginning of the sermon.

What's the problem with hoping in man?

The best of men are but mere men.

We get one of the best men in the history of humanity here in this chapter. There are few like David. He's a man after God's own heart. He has God's favor. He is been long suffering. He is avoided self-seeking. He sees himself as a servant of the people. He's a man of faith, a man of hope. And yet we read in verse 13, David took more concubines and more wise from Jerusalem. He's a really good man and he's a really awful man.

Some of those marriages were surely for alliances to make the realm safer. He's thinking about the country and thus he's taking some of them, you know, in the eyes of the world that would've been wise. But all of them are sinful.

That's the problem with hoping in man. He will always fail you, whether it's someone else or yourself always. We will never solve the world's problems because we are the world's problem.

There's that famous story of an essay contest in the times in 1910, asking writers to answer that essay question, write in and answer it, what's wrong with the world? And GK Chesterton wrote the shortest essay in response to that and he said, dear sirs, I am, he understood. He knew sin and he knew the effects upon his own person. 1910 was only a few years before the entire world would be racked by the greed of men. And the great depression would be ushered in.

And only a few years after that, the entire world would erupt in war and men would literally gas one another to death only to be surpassed. A few years later by World War II where we would put men in concentration camps and death camps and drop atomic bombs on each other.

Man is not the answer.

'cause man is a sinner.

We're not sinners because we sin. We sin because we're sinners.

That's who you are. That's who I am. You don't need me. You don't need the person sitting next to you in the pew.

You need one holy outside of yourself that is righteous and true, that is holy and perfect, that will conquer you and bring peace.

And you think about David, you think, well maybe it was because now all of a sudden he, he, he's no longer in trial and he's in this kind of place of, of relative peace in the city of Jerusalem. And maybe he just let his guard down and but it's who he is. He's a sinner that's often in the law, not just when we're suffering, that we are most tempted to sin. See us Lewis in the screw tape letters. He has a senior devil writing

to an apprentice about prosperity and what a useful trap it is. And the senior devil writes, prosperity knits a man to the world. He feels he is finding his place in it while really it is finding its place in him. His increasing reputation, his widening circle of acquaintances, his sense of importance, the growing pressure of absorbing and agreeable work build up in him a sense of really being at home and earth, which is just what we want.

He said, oh man, if my life was just not so troubled, you're still a sinner.