Well, I invite you to turn in your Bibles to 1 Samuel 22. We'll be looking today, continuing on in chapter 22 of 1 Samuel. If you're following along on one of the church Bibles, you can find the passage on page 243. It's in the Old Testament there. If you're following along in your Order of Service, it's also printed on page 8. We'll be looking at this text in just a moment. Last week, we saw David's desperation. Saul had threatened to kill him. He's hunting him down. He wants David destroyed, and so David is on the run. And we saw last week how David went to the priests and he was given some supplies and then he decided to go to Gath and realized that wasn't a good idea when he is the giant slayer to go back to the giant's hometown. And he acted out of his mind in able to escape that difficult situation. But one of the things that we really noticed as we looked at the Psalms that David wrote about that time, was that amidst the fear and amidst the desperation that he felt, David was turning to the Lord in trust. It's not something that made all the scariness go away, but it was a faithful response that the Lord was using in his life and in the kingdom work. Well, this week we couldn't come to a more opposite story. We now get a glimpse of what's going on in Saul's life during the time, and we get a first-hand look at Saul's desperation. And I just want to warn you up front, if you haven't looked at the passage, it's actually very dark. It is something that's hard to read and see how Saul, in his desperation, doesn't go in trust to the Lord. but instead turns to very destructive ways. And as we consider the passage this morning, it really raises a question for us right from the start. Where do we go when life is difficult? Where do you turn and to what ways do you act out when things aren't going how you'd hoped they would go? What do you do when it seems like the enemies all around seem to be winning? When it seems like things are changing in your situation that are going to make life harder, and they're not the way you want them to go? Well, this chapter will be a very powerful warning for us, that in those moments where we feel desperate, there is a very strong temptation to turn toward destruction. But not only does it warn us, it also points us to the remedy that we need of what God wants to work in us through the Lord Jesus. And so we'll see that also as we go. And so this morning, I'd like to walk through the text a bit and then draw out two applications. And so before we begin that process of turning to God's word, let's pray one more time and ask for his help as we consider it. Our Father in Heaven, we come humbly asking that you would give us words of life. Will you help us to see the true nature of our situation and our hearts? And will you encourage us afresh with how you are renewing us by your Spirit through the work that Jesus has done for us? And so, Spirit, we pray that you would help us to see and hear our Savior's voice and the truth in these words. We ask this all in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, our outline this morning is pretty simple. We'll start with the story of Saul's desperation as we walk through the text. The story of Saul's desperation. And then two applications. The nature of Saul's destruction then finally the certainty of God's victory. And so I'll walk through those together with you as we go, but that's where we're headed. So let's consider first of all the story of Saul's desperation, and we see that in our passage chapter 22 verses 6 to 23. We'll start by looking at verses 6 through 8. Now Saul heard that David was discovered and the men who were with him Saul was sitting at Gibeah, under the tamarisk tree, on the height, with his spear in his hand. And all his servants were standing about him. And Saul said to his servants who stood about him, Here now, people of Benjamin, will the son of Jesse give every one of you fields and vineyards? Will he make you all commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds, that all of you have conspired against me? No one discloses to me when my son makes a covenant with the son of Jesse. None of you is sorry for me or discloses to me that my son has stirred up my servant against me to lie in wait as at this day." Let's just stop there for a moment. Saul is here in his hometown of Gibeah, and so he's surrounded by friends. He's surrounded by friends and loyal people. But he hears that people have seen David and they've seen the people who have come to David. You remember the group of misfits overall who are seeking refuge with David. And here he is with his trusted advisors, he's with his elite guard who traveled with him. And the scene is already ominous because Saul has his spear in his hand. By now, Saul probably should have learned, let's just set that thing down. Every time Saul has his spear in his hand, I don't know how it brought him comfort, but it must have. And it doesn't go well when Saul has his spear with him. And we hear what's in Saul's heart by the words that he says and the questions he raises. In his questions, he accuses his followers and friends, those who are with him, of being seduced by David's promise of wealth. He believes that the people around him have conspired against him. And just like he thinks Jonathan, his son, has encouraged David to seek to kill Saul, which isn't true, that's not what Jonathan is doing, that's not what David is doing, he thinks these people around him are in it as well. And I wonder, what was it like for everyone standing around to hear Saul's questioning? I just picture them kind of looking around at each other thinking, what is he talking about? None of this is true. Is today the first time that I have inquired of God for him? No. Let not the king impute anything to his servant or to all the house of my father. For your servant has known nothing of all of this, much or little. And the king said, "'You shall surely die, Ahimelech, "'you and all your father's house.' And the king said to the guard who stood about him, "'Turn and kill the priests of the Lord, "'because their hand is also with David.' And they knew that he fled and did not disclose it to me. But the servants of the king would not put out their hand to strike the priests of the Lord. Then the king said to Doeg, "'You turn and strike the priests.' And Doeg the Edomite turned and struck down the priests. And he killed on that day 85 persons who wore the linen ephod. And Nob, the city of the priests, he put to sword. Both man and woman, child and infant, ox, donkey, and sheep, he put to the sword." Stop there for a moment. It's really a horrific scene. pretty much speaks for itself, but I just wanna make a few comments. Doeg, the non-Israelite, is happy to give this information to Saul. And we're not gonna look at all of what he says, but suffice it to say, he's strategic about what he says and about what he leaves out. And he presents it in a way that plays right into Saul's overall narrative. And then when Ahimelech is summoned to Saul, the dialogue really shifts to courtroom discussion. That's how that language is working there. And Saul treats him with the same contempt as he treats David. He won't even say his name. He's the son of Ahithob. He's not Ahimelech to him. And Saul's accusation at its very core is clear. He's accusing Ahimelech of conspiring against him and intentionally helping David overthrow him. and he comes and he reports the massacre to David. And again, the term that he used there for killed is a term for indiscriminate revenge killing that Saul is doing. He sees what this really is. And David remembers Doeg's presence that day when he desperately came before the priests. But what's really amazing about this section, what's really the highlight and the climax of it, is David's response to the situation. Here, on the one hand, you have Saul, who won't own anything that he's done. Why aren't any of you sorry for me and all that's happening to me is what Saul is saying under the tamarisk tree. But what David did here was nowhere near as wrong. It was sketchy. He made a calculated risk in deciding what to tell and not tell Ahimelech and how he handled the truth. But it was complicated, right? Far less complicated than Saul slaughtering priests. And yet, what does David do? He takes complete ownership. In verse 22, I have occasioned the death of all the persons in your father's house. He doesn't pity himself, and instead he seeks to protect those under his care, even though he failed to do so through this calculated risk. And the story ends with this powerful contrast of Saul, who's in his desperation, raging, you shall surely die. And then these amazing words of David saying, you are safe with me. Not because David thinks he's so powerful or so invincible. That's not what that is. Some sort of cockiness of you'll be okay because look at these muscles or whatever that might be. I've got Goliath's sword. It's not a self-confidence assurance. It's because he trusts in God's word. He trusts that God's promise to raise him up as the anointed one will, in fact, come to pass. And Saul, who seeks his life, also seeks the life of Abiathar, but somehow Saul will not prevail. And David speaks this comfort to Abiathar there. So the story is calling us to see a few things, but First, really, what it's doing is helping us see how desperation really tempts us toward destruction instead of David-like trust that we saw last week and even see in this passage. And so, I want us to look at what this passage teaches by way of two applications. And the first is the nature of Saul's destruction. The nature of Saul's destruction. There's a sense in which we should pity Saul, right? We read this, and his life is absolutely miserable. And yet, that pity moves on, kind of, as we come to see that most, if not all, of his situation is of his own making. There's a way forward for Saul, but he refuses to take it. And what this passage shows for us are three characteristics of his destructive behavior. Three things that it really highlights that I think for us are warning lights that come on if we see these things happening, there's a deep level of destruction that's taking place. And so I want us to think about those three things. The first is Saul will not repent of his sin. Saul will not repent of his sin. He's in this entire situation because of his sin against the Lord. And we've heard that earlier about offering the sacrifice and not listening to God's explicit command. But then on the heels of that, instead of repenting for how he sinned against the Lord, Saul just keeps piling sin onto the whole equation. He is having multiple angry outbursts. He's screaming out slander and threats. He's trying to kill people. And yet he's not dealing with any of that, is he? Instead, what does he do? He uses his circumstances, which are difficult, but he uses them to elicit pity. He portrays himself as the victim in all of this to gain sympathy from his followers. Under the tamarisk tree, he's saying, can you believe it? Aren't you sorry for me? David and Jonathan, they're trying to kill me. Well, I can't imagine why. It's not true, first of all. They're not trying to kill him. But the reason David and Jonathan are gone is because he's trying to kill them. And he's not desperate to make things right. Saul instead is desperate to get what he wants. And so Saul will not repent of his sin. That's the first characteristic of his destructive behavior. But then secondly, Saul won't do the good that he should do. Saul won't do the good he should do. As king, there are a lot of good things that should be filling Saul's days. One of those things should be reading and taking in the law of God, so he responds under the law of God. Other things that he should be doing would be leading the people in fairness and justice. And another thing would be fighting the enemies of God's people. All throughout 1 Samuel, the Philistines are everywhere. They haven't been driven out like God wants to have happen. But what is Saul's argument? See that his responses to other people are way out of proportion of what is actually taking place. David doesn't come to dinner and be surprising to us at all. What's surprising to us is this is the king considering the nature of Saul's destruction and the warnings that we see. But you may be thinking, why does this matter? We are a long way from Nob. We are a long way from Saul. I didn't see anyone enter with a spear in their hand. And so people are naive to how these destructive dynamics play out. especially when it comes to church leadership, or leadership in the home, or whenever someone finds themselves in a position of authority or power. And so, as Christians, we need to be wise to this type of behavior and know how to wisely address it. And these are things that we've talked about elsewhere, and we could talk more further if those are questions that you have. Things that we read, the things that we watch, Are they discipling us in the destructive ways of Saul? You see, destruction like this, it thrives on desperation. That's what's going on here. Saul is desperate because he feels like he's losing his kingdom. He feels like he's losing what he thinks he should have. And we live in a world where the information that comes at us, no matter what format you take it in, if it's a newspaper, kids, do you know what those are? But if it's a newspaper, if it's the TV, if it's your social media feed, if it's your YouTube channel, whether it is a producer or an algorithm, it is all designed to do something, and it is designed to make you feel desperate. That's what it's doing, and that's proven beyond a doubt. And so what that means is, if everything around us is trying to make us feel desperate, then there's a huge temptation for us to respond like Saul in some of these destructive ways. And so what really concerns me in all of this is, on the one hand, I'm concerned what's happening to our country and to our nation and the polarization and the tribalism and all that's taking place within that. And I think we as Christians have a stewardship toward that and should seek to do good and to address it. So hear all that. but then hear this on YouTube or on TV or anything. I don't know. I've been gone. And so I feel like it's a time I can actually say these things from God's Word. The other caveat is this. I know that we live in a time when pastoral trust is very low. People trust pastors very little. We trust many things very little right now. And we're tempted to think that things are coming to us because of an angle or an agenda. I just want to tell you, if you could just trust me in this, my only agenda and my only angle is that we stare God's Word in the face. The first one is Saul will not repent. Well right now it is viewed as weak to own any wrongs that you or people on your side, whatever that may be, have done. You can't own any wrongs. We can't look at the ways we may have fallen short, even if things are complicated. David here goes a different way. He owns even the unintended consequences of his actions of really complicated situations that he's just trying to navigate and not even out of ill will. And so David shows us a way where we can actually own our wrongs, but what's being told to us all the time is you can't do that, and that leads to destruction. The second thing is Saul won't do the good that God has clearly called him to do, because he's focused on all of these other issues, right? And the issues that Saul's focused on are explicitly destructive. But think, believers, everything around us is geared toward trying to get us riled up about issues. And many of those can be good issues. But getting us riled up means it takes them to a wrong proportion. And it makes us just stop and say, are the things that make people small? and the issue's really big. And people become nameless to us. We just put them in a label. And it's so much easier to talk about a label of a type of person than to actually use their names. And when we do use their names, it's often just with disgust and disdain about what so-and-so is doing. And it's all the rage right now. that if you agree with someone that I disagree with, then you are my enemy, and I can treat you as such. If you even say, oh, maybe they have a point or are noticing something, boom, you are just as bad as all of my enemies. And just like Saul was doing, it's often fun things to watch. Maybe some of us need to unsubscribe to certain YouTube channels and subscribe to other ones. Maybe our feeds need to change. Maybe we need to dial back all of this stuff and dial up things that truly reflect God's kingdom heart. And that's where we go next in our application. What do we do instead? Well, our passage shows us how God is at work even in what seems like desperate circumstances, and that perspective really helps us to respond differently than Saul's destruction. And so that brings us to our second application and our last point, the certainty of God's kingdom victory. The certainty of God's kingdom victory. One of the things that we may not immediately notice as we just look at this passage is is that the destruction that happens to the priests has been foretold by God already. I don't know if you remember, but back in chapter two, we were introduced to the wickedness of Eli's sons. They're doing horrific things in the name of Yahweh as his priests. And Eli doesn't do anything about it. He honors them over honoring the Lord. And so the man of God comes and tells Eli that because of this wickedness, that his descendants shall die by the sword." And not only does he say that the priestly line of Eli will be cut off, but it even says that one will not be cut off, but he will weep his eyes out to grieve his heart. It even foretells one will escape, and he will be very sad. Well, that judgment that God foretold in chapter 2 was fulfilled through the evil actions of Doeg. because Ahimelech was the great-grandson of Eli. God will remove Eli's line, and he will raise up a faithful priest." So what are we to think of this? I know this can be a lot. We've already talked about a lot, right? And now we raise God's foretold judgment. I just want to say a few things. One, it can be hard to hear that God's will was for a whole line of priests to die. and for us to understand how was that just, how was that good, how was that right. I'd love to talk with you more about that if you're wrestling with that and if it's really hanging you up, we can talk about that. But just a short summary is just, at the end of the day, the Bible clearly shows that God only does what is right and just. And even though we don't understand how this whole calculation works out, especially in an Old Testament context, we can trust that somehow this must be right. But again, I'm happy to talk further. But instead plan. Dale Ralph Davis, who's a pastor and a commentator, he talks about how to understand these things and he uses an illustration that I found really helpful. He saw it and thought it was him, he would punch it as hard as he could. And so his entire plan worked, right? Now, That illustration fails on a bunch of levels. Here's where it fails. The character of these brothers, and particularly that one who's just delighting in the mistreatment and all that kind of stuff. We could go down that road. But what it really highlights for us well is that God takes the punches of evil And he incorporates them into the city of Nob and our hearts break. We see those 85 blood-stained ephods and we cry out to God. And yet, along with the grief, is a story I'm telling you God will always preserve his people. So I want us to think a little bit more about what's going on. The destruction here is so overwhelming. that sometimes we may lose sight of God's miraculous preservation that took place. Abiathar somehow escapes this slaughter, and he finds David, even though Saul will never be able to find David. This one lone priest can find him. God provided bread and a sword and a blessing for David, and now God has provided David with a priest to help him with his small band of misfits. but 85 priests are dead and Nob lies in ruins." And you see, what this passage calls us to is what Scripture calls us to. Our awareness of God's kingdom victory is both realistic and it's confident. Dale Ralph Davis says it just so beautifully, I'm going to read his words. Abiathar's escape does not mean that all God's servants are immune from the world heart. Even David will leave a trail of destruction in his wake, won't he? Use his power to take. He will prey upon people rather than protect. And that's why ultimately what this passage calls us to is not to look upon David, but to look upon his greater son. And you see, Jesus shows us the way to walk even when we feel desperate. Think about those things that Saul did and think of how different Jesus is than that. Saul wouldn't own his own wrongs. Jesus had no wrongs, but he owned your wrongs and my wrongs so that we could be forgiven. He paid for all of the times we have responded in destructive ways. He even paid for all of the times when we had to take a calculated risk and others were hurt by it. Not only did he take on our wrongs, but think also of the actions that he did. Saul was inactive about the things of God. He was pursuing his own kingdom and his own agenda. Jesus woke up every moment of every day in obedience to his father's agenda. Saul brooded over conspiracy theories under a tamarisk tree. Jesus was willingly raised up on a tree. out of obedience to his father so he could save us from all of our inaction and all of our destructive ways. Saul, when he was about his kingdom, mistreated other people because he suspected that they were his enemies. Jesus knew that we were his enemies on Satan's side. ready to kill him, to crucify him. And what did he do? He offered up his life so that you and I could be forgiven, even while we were still his enemies. And what does he do now? He enables us now, by his Spirit, he grows in us a love of neighbor and a love even of our enemies, as we seek to follow in his ways of holding forth perfect truth in perfect love for everyone we encounter. You see, Jesus shows us a way that's different than Saul. He shows us a way that's different than the kingdoms of this world. But not only does he show it to us, he gives us confidence as we walk in it, doesn't he? Because we look to Jesus' cross, and what do we see? When evil's blows feel like they're far too much for us, when we feel like we'll never make it or the church will never survive, we look at the cross and we see when evil landed its greatest blow, behind that was God's greatest victory. And you and I are a part of that. And so we look to the cross and we see confidence in God's victory, but we see even more than that. We look to the empty tomb and we see the sureness of the word that Jesus says to us. David was able to say, you're safe with me because he was trusting in what God would do. And those things did come to pass. Jesus says to us, lo, I am with you even to the end of the age. You are safe with me. Why? Not because he hopes it will come to pass, but because he has gone through death itself. He has been raised for our justification. The verdict has been rendered. He is in resurrection life, and we too will share in that resurrection life because he earned it for us. And He is ruling and reigning until we taste it fully when He returns, and we know forever what it means to be in the steadfast love of the Lord that never fails. You see, as we fix our eyes on Jesus, it shows us a different way, and it gives us the confidence we need in the midst of what feels so desperate to us. And so let's pray and ask that he would help us in that. Our Father, we thank you for your word and the way that it is a mirror to our hearts. It's a compass. It's a light in the darkness. It shows us. the ways we can err, but then it holds out the beauty of the light that is broken in through Jesus' work, and the ways that your Spirit is at work in us even now, making us more like Jesus. We pray that you would do that in these dark and desperate times. Will you help us to walk in trust? Will you help us to follow in the ways of our Savior? Will you help us to be certain of what all lies ahead because of what He has done? It's in his name we pray, amen.