00:00
00:00
00:01
Transcript
1/0
Greetings, greetings, church,
and greetings to all of you who are watching us via YouTube. Just want to say this has been
a very good week. In spite of what Saturday Night
Live thinks, this has been a very good week. So I'm very pleased
and thankful that we again have this freedom and opportunity
to come together. Lord, I want to come to you this
morning to give thanks and praise for all of your blessings, all
of your goodness, and all just of the freedoms that we still
are able to enjoy. Lord, grant us the ability as
we enjoy that freedom to sit down, to hear your word, to take
the gift of your Holy Spirit who accompanies your word and
to make this a permanent value. And we pray this in Jesus' name,
amen. We've been working our way through
the book of 1 Samuel, and when we last left Israel, we found
them insisting on a king. Now that God had guided them
and protected them for literally centuries has made no difference.
Every single nation surrounding Israel had a king, and they wanted
a king as well. And so in spite of the humiliation
of his people's rejection, God agrees to this request. I mean, at this point in time,
Israel is making a very short-sighted demand. They want a king just
like all the other nations. They were surrounded on one side
by the Philistines, on the other side by the Ammonites, and after
many, many years of armed conflict, they were no longer interested
in trusting God to be their defender. And to be sure, many times during
this time, they suffered defeat, they suffered rejection. But
in each case, it was directly the result of them giving up
the real God and going after false gods. I mean, it's safe
to say that Israel, they simply grew tired of having to give
an account before their God. and they grew tired of having
to answer to him, and instead they preferred to have a standing
army and a king like all the other nations to address their
defense. Now we may shake our head at
their intransigence, but we have the benefit of looking at the
broad sweep of their history in a manner of moments. I mean,
we can see that whenever they placed their trust fully in God,
he surrounded them, he blessed them, he protected them, and
whenever they departed from him, excuse me, that protection broke
down. Bad things happened. And after a while, the pattern
established itself so much so that instead of returning to
God, they decided, no, we're done with that. They wanted to
be like all the other nations around them. And you know, looking
at their situation makes me think that we're not that far removed
from ancient Israel. I mean, you have to understand
that the sweep of historical time takes hundreds of years
and treats them as if they're mere moments. And so if we go
back 10, 15, 20, 30, 75 years, we can certainly see our pattern
is very similar to Israel's. And that is we too have rejected
a corporate acknowledgment of God. We have systematically gone
about the task of removing every vestige of God from our public
life. You know, God is no longer welcomed
in our schools, in our town hall meetings, in our local and state
governments. For many, many years now, we've
listened to our Philistines who have insisted that God has no
place whatsoever in the civic life of a nation. We now find
ourselves in a position that Israel found itself in. I mean,
as a nation, we can't look to God for strength and protection
because our law now forbids that. We asked to God literally years
ago. So now we're looking for cultural weapons to protect us
from a culture war that we find ourselves in when in reality
we should have been looking to God in the first place. Years
ago we told God we just wanted him out of the public square
and we've largely achieved our goal. Now here we find Israel
about to embark on a similar political strategy. And God gives
them ample warning. He's telling them that a king
is going to demand a great deal from them and he's going to give
them very little in return. This is what he said in 1 Samuel
8 15. He said he will take a tenth of your grain and of your vineyards
and give it to his officers and to his servants. He will take
your male servants and female servants and the best of your
young men and your donkeys and put them to his work. He will
take the tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves.
And in that day when you cry out because of your king, whom
you have chosen for yourselves, but the Lord will not answer
you in that day." Now, having just castigated Israel for rebellion,
God then sets about the task of providing them a king. I mean,
he tells them, here's what's wrong in wanting a king, and
here's the damage a king is going to do to you But here's how to
get a cane. And that doesn't seem to make
much sense. I mean, we saw last time, God oftentimes does things
that absolutely befuddle us. And we looked at it last time
with regard to prayer. We considered God's attitude
towards prayer. You know, on the one hand, we
have God insisting that we pray without ceasing, that we be insistent,
even impudent in our prayers for our loved ones. And yet,
in spite of that insistence, we oftentimes see little or no
answer. to those prayers. And I pointed
out that one of the sources of our difficulty is the time frame
that all of us operate from. You see, we, particularly in
the West, we want things, all of us want things yesterday. God has a unique timetable for
everything to fall into. And for most of us, it's way,
way too slow. I mean, we absolutely believe
in Romans 8.28 that all things work together for good. But as
I said, that good is God's good, not necessarily what we think
of good. And oftentimes that involves
timetables that God is working out of. So yes, sometimes God
will insist that we pray for our loved ones and we may go
decades seeing absolutely no results. And part of the reason
for that is should God answer our prayer in the affirmative,
He still has to position the answer in the very best set of
circumstances for our good and his glory. And that just may
take decades. It might also be instantaneous.
I mean, literally only God knows. That's also why after many, many
years, in spite of the humiliation, God is now answering their request
for a king. You see, the time has become
right for God to institute a new form of government in Israel.
And the reason being, he's in the process of establishing a
kingly line that's going to result in the birth of Jesus. And here
we get to see God's providence at work. I mean, out of all of
this desire for a king is going to come King David. And out of
King David's line is going to come King Jesus. And so once
again, we see the providence of God working itself out through
oftentimes sinful human failings. I mean, having agreed to provide
a king for Israel, then God sets about that task. And that's what
we come on as we read 1 Samuel 9 verses 1 through 13. It's a
story. It says, there was a man of Benjamin,
whose name was Kish, the son of Abel, son of Zerur, son of
Bekorah, son of Aphiah, a Benjaminite, a man of wealth. And he had a
son whose name was Saul, a handsome young man. There was not a man
among the people of Israel more handsome than he. From his shoulders
upward, he was taller than any of the people. Okay, God is starting
out. He's just stating a fact about
this new king that Israel is going to anoint. And again, we
find a similarity between this man Saul and our political process. You see, in both cases, it's
always the externals that attract people. It's not his heart. It's
not his character. It's the fact that he's tall
and he's good looking. Verse three says, Now the donkeys of
Kish, Saul's father, were lost. So Kish said to Saul, his son,
take one of the young men with you and arise. Go and look for
the donkeys. And he passed through the hill
country of Ephraim, and he passed through the land of Shalisha,
but they did not find them. And they passed through the land
of Shalim, but they were not there. Then they passed through
the land of Benjamin, but did not find them. When they came
to the land of Zuf, Saul said to his servant who was with him,
come, let us go back lest my father cease to care about the
donkeys and become anxious about us. But he said to him, behold,
there's a man of God in this city, and he's a man who was
held in honor. All that he says comes true.
So now let us go there. Perhaps he can tell us the way
we should go. So here's Saul's servant, and he's suggesting
they seek the counsel of this well-known spiritual leader.
And the servant tells Saul that this guy is clearly a man of
God. He's held in high honor. Everything this man says comes
true. Well, Saul and his servant then give us a big hint as to
where they are spiritually. He's talking about Samuel. Samuel
is Israel's spiritual leader, but Saul doesn't even know his
name. He goes on to say, then Saul
said to his servant, but if we go, what can we bring this man?
For the bread in our sacks is gone, and there's no present
to bring to the man of God. What do we have?' The servant
answered Saul again, Here I have with me a quarter of a shekel
of silver, and I will give it to the man of God to tell us
our way. And formerly in Israel, when a man went to inquire of
God, he said, Come, let us go to the seer. For today's prophet
was formerly called a seer. And Saul said to his servant,
Well said. Come, let us go. So they went
to the city where the man of God was. I mean, you can tell
Saul and his servants are clueless when it comes to honoring or
even meeting with the prophet of God. We pick up on verse 11.
It says, As they went up the hill to the city, they met a
young woman coming out to draw water and said to them, Is the
seer here? They answered, He is. Behold,
he is just ahead of you. Hurry. He has come just now to
the city, because the people have a sacrifice today on the
high place. As soon as you enter the city, you will find him,
because he goes up to the high place to eat. For the people
will not eat till he comes, since he must bless the sacrifice.
Afterwards, those who are invited will eat. Now go up, for you
will meet him immediately." Now, in what might have been one of
the very first in a series of providential consequences, It
just so happens that Saul and his servant arrive in town at
the very same time that this feast is being planned with Samuel
to bless it. Again, verse 14 says, So they
went up to the city, and as they were entering the city, they
saw Samuel coming out toward them on his way up to the high
place. Now the day before Saul came, the Lord had revealed to
Samuel, Tomorrow, about this time, I will send you a man from
the land of Benjamin, and you shall anoint him to be prince
over my people Israel. He shall save my people from
the hand of the Philistines, for I've seen my people because
their cry has come to me." Now, what we see here is God is literally
taking us behind the scenes in what seems like an apparently
coincidental meeting. And actually, we find out that
it has far more of a connection than we at first realized. And
I'm looking at that, and I'm just wondering, and I'm not wondering,
I know this is the way things are, not just for them, but for
all of us. I mean, what if God's interaction
with this world is not just with Samuel and Saul, but it's also
with Mary and Sue and Bill and Bob and every Mary and Sue and
Bill and Bob in the world? I mean, what if God is actively
doing what he says he does in Romans 8, 28? guiding every single
event so that it works together for good in a way that doesn't
violate our free will, but still allows God's providence to work
through it in a way that guarantees that it's going to come out for
good. You know, the more you actually believe that, the more
it's going to revolutionize, excuse me, it's going to revolutionize
your walk with God. We pick up on verse 17. It says, When Samuel saw Saul, the Lord told him, Here is a
man of whom I spoke to you. He it is who will restrain my
people. Then Saul approached Samuel in
the gate and said, Tell me, where is the house of the seer? Samuel
answered Saul, I am the seer. Go up before me to the high place,
for today you shall eat with me. And in the morning I will
let you go and will tell you all that is on your mind. And
what we see taking place here is, this is not a two-way conversation. It's literally a three-way. I
mean, God is speaking to Samuel as Samuel is speaking to Saul.
And Saul simply approached him as a stranger looking for directions.
So God is certainly making the case that Saul is, he's not some
kind of king in waiting. This is a guy who's simply looking
for his donkeys. I mean, he's got plans. But God has other plans. Samuel
says, as for your donkeys that were lost three days ago, do
not set your mind on them for they have been found. And for
whom is all that is desirable in Israel? Is it not for you
and for all your father's house? And so Samuel tells Saul, I got
news for you. All of Israel has set its desire
on you and your family. It says, Saul answered, Am I
not a Benjaminite from the least of the tribes of Israel? And
is not my clan the humblest of all the clans of the tribe of
Benjamin? Why then have you spoken to me in this way? Like I said,
Saul's just a guy out looking for his donkeys. I mean, he's
completely unprepared for this turn of events that indicates
that he's also not really happy about it. It goes on to say in
verse 22, then Samuel took Saul and his young man and brought
them into the hall and gave them a place at the head of those
who had been invited, who were about 30 persons. And Samuel
said to the cook, bring the portion I gave you of which I said you
put it aside. So the cook took up the leg and
what was on it and set it before Saul. And Samuel said, see, what
was kept is set before you. eat, because it was kept for
you until the hour appointed, that you might eat with the guests.
So Saul ate with Samuel that day. And when they came down
from the high place into the city, a bed was spread for Saul
on the roof, and he lay down to sleep. Then at the break of
dawn, Samuel called to Saul on the roof, Up, that I may send
you on your way. So Saul arose, and both he and
Samuel went out into the street. As they were going down to the
outskirts of the city, Samuel said to Saul, tell the servant
to pass on before us. And when he has passed on, stop
here yourself for a while, that I may make known to you the word
of God." So just picture this. Saul's search for his father's
donkeys has now brought him completely unexpectedly to a banquet, where
he's now seated at the head, given the choicest portions.
And that's followed up with a night stay that ends up the following
morning with Samuel walking Saul and his servant out of the city.
And just before they get to the outskirts of the city, Samuel
tells Saul to have the servant kind of walk on so that he can
say something to him privately. And what he says, we don't know,
but Samuel states it's from the word of God. But what he does
next, what he does next had to have stunned and amazed Saul. 1 Samuel 10 verse 1 says, Well,
if anyone desperately needed a sign, it was certainly Saul. I mean, the events of this day
go from, I'm looking for my donkeys, to being anointed the king of
Israel. And so God graciously tells Saul,
he's going to provide ample proof that this isn't a dream, this
is not your imagination. It's backed up by circumstances
that are going to unfold in the immediate future. And just get
an idea of the detail that follows in what Samuel says to Saul.
He's going to explain to him what's going to happen. He says,
when you depart from me today, you will meet two men by Rachel's
tomb in the territory of Benjamin at Zelza. And they will say to
you, the donkeys that you went to seek are found. And now your
father has ceased to care about the donkeys and is anxious about
you, saying, what shall I do about my son? Then you shall
go from there farther and come to the oak of Tabor. Three men
going up to God at Bethel will meet you there, one carrying
three young goats, another carrying three loaves of bread, and another
carrying a skin of wine. And they will greet you and give
you two loaves of bread, which you shall accept from their hand.
After that, you shall come to Gibeath Elohim, where there is
a garrison of the Philistines. And there, as soon as you come
to the city, you will meet a group of prophets coming down from
the high place with harp, tambourine, flute, and lyre before them,
prophesying. Then the Spirit of the Lord will
rush upon you, and you will prophesy with them and be turned into
another man. Now when these signs meet you,
do what your hand finds to do, for God is with you. Here's where
we have our first important question to address about Saul. Samuel
tells Saul, he says, the spirit of God is going to rush upon
you, and you're going to prophesy, and you're going to be turned
into another man. So the question we ask is, was that other man,
quote unquote, was that other man truly saved? You see Samuel
didn't say you will become another man, he said you'll be turned
into another man. He's simply warning Saul that God's spirit
is going to come rushing upon him. And the question that haunts
any account of Saul's life is what did that spirit do? Where
did Saul wind up? I mean we all know he started
out spectacularly, but we all know that in the end it was a
disaster. And folks from that conclude
that he was never truly saved. And so my answer to the question
of Saul's salvation is that I have no idea. I do know, however,
that there are two very different experiences of God's Holy Spirit.
You see, you might be temporarily empowered by the Holy Spirit,
something that God often used in the Old Testament to give
strength and power supernaturally to individuals in order to accomplish
his will, or you may be indwelt by his Holy Spirit, which is
the primary sign of genuine conversion. I mean, we have ample examples
of the Holy Spirit empowering individuals. We have it from
Gideon to Jephthah to Samson. And in each case, these individuals,
they were just kind of thrust into leadership and given this
supernatural power on a temporary basis in order to accomplish
what they needed to in order to lead. You know, when Israel
was surrounded by the Amalekites and the Midianites, Gideon called
on his fellow Jews to muster a counterattack. And if you study
anything about Gideon, you know that warfare was not his ballywick.
But just like Saul, God raised him up for a particular moment
and empowered him for it. If you look at Judges 634, it
says, but the spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon, and he sounded
the trumpet, and the Ebizrites were called out to follow him.
We look at Jephthah. Jephthah was the disgraced son
of a prostitute who was called upon by God to raise up an army
to defend themselves against the Ammonites. And we find there
God's spirit empowered him as well. Judges 11 says, then the
spirit of the Lord was upon Jephthah and he passed through Gilead
and Manasseh and passed on to Mizpah of Gilead and from Mizpah
of Gilead he passed on to the Ammonites. And then we have Samson. Everybody knows Samson. What's
not known is that God's Holy Spirit rushed on him repeatedly
to empower him to do his acts of supernatural strength. Again,
Judges 14. It says, then Samson went down
with his father and mother to Timnah, and they came to the
vineyards of Timnah. And behold, a young lion came
toward him roaring. Then the Spirit of the Lord rushed
upon him. And although he had nothing in
his hand, he tore the lion in pieces as one tears a young goat. But he did not tell his father
or his mother what he had done. I mean, all these instances raise
the question, what is the difference between the Spirit of God granting
someone the power to do something extraordinary and the Spirit
of God bringing someone to salvation in Christ? Well, to understand
that, we need to go to the New Testament. We need to go to the
account of Nicodemus to learn how he became born again. This is John 3, verses 1 through
8, another story. He says, now there was a man
of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man
came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you
are a teacher come from God, for no one can do the signs that
you do unless God is with him. Jesus answered him, truly, truly,
I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom
of God. Nicodemus said to him, How can
a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into
his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered, Truly, truly,
I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot
enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh
is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not
marvel that I said to you, you must be born again. The wind
blows where it wishes and you hear its sound, but you do not
know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone
who was born of the spirit. Now, we all know the term born
again. I mean, it's become part of our cultural lexicon. For
a lot of people, though, it's become a term of derision. You
know, born again is now a term that's largely used to refer
to people who are not too bright and too far right. but it comes
straight from Scripture. I mean, the actual dialogue between
Jesus and Nicodemus shows just how the Holy Spirit operates
when we come to know Christ. And so we look at what Jesus
is saying to Nicodemus, and the very first thing he tells him
is that there has to be not one birth, but two, to even see the
kingdom of God. And the first birth is pretty
obvious. It's the birth that gave you flesh and blood. It's the birth
that enables you to exist. Jesus tells Nicodemus, though,
you must be born again. That's the second birth that's
required. He goes on to say, that which is born of flesh is
flesh, that which is born of spirit is spirit. Now the word
spirit that Jesus uses in the Greek is the word pneuma. I'm
sure you've heard that, you've heard of pneumatic tires, and
pneuma has to do with air. Pneumatic tires are tires that
you fill with air. Think of pneumonia. It has to
deal with lungs. Lungs are the organ responsible
for taking in air or wind. So pneuma, by analogy, also means
spirit, which is also invisible, like the wind. When Jesus speaks
of pneuma or wind, he's speaking about the second person of the
Trinity. He's speaking about God's Holy Spirit. And he tells
Nicodemus, the wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound,
but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes.
So it is with everyone who was born of the Spirit. And what
Jesus is telling him is that God alone has the power to open
up eyes and ears and hearts to the truth of the gospel, and
that the Spirit of God in some ways is just like the wind. Quote,
you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. That's
to say you can see where the wind is going by its effects,
but you have no ability whatsoever to make the wind blow in one
direction or another. I mean, if those folks in Florida
who were in the pathway of that hurricane knew the way to control
the wind, they'd have the ability to send that hurricane out to
sea. They'd have received no damage. But we all know for the
past 2,000 years, we've recognized that no one has that power but
God alone. And Jesus tells Nicodemus that
the spirit of God answers to no one but God, and it blows
in whatever direction it wants to blow. Everyone who's born
of the Spirit has had the power of God's Holy Spirit open his
eyes and ears and heart and mind in the same way that we speak
of back to the Old Testament in Ezekiel 36. And there God
describes the actual process of conversion, what it actually
consists of. This is what God says in Ezekiel
36. He says, I will take you from the nations and gather you
from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will
sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all
your uncleanness. And from all your idols I will
cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit
I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of
stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will
put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes
and be careful to obey my rules. So here in the Old Testament,
God is describing the actual process of conversion as one
in which he removes the heart of stone, which all of us have
been born with, and then replaces it with a living heart of flesh.
But then he goes on to say, and I will put my spirit within you. Now that we're in the Old Testament,
we're not looking at Greek, we're looking at Hebrew. And the word
spirit in Hebrew is ruach. And guess what that means? It
means wind. The very same wind or pneuma
that Jesus was speaking of when he told Nicodemus, the wind blows
where it wishes. I mean, did you notice, if you're
looking in your Bible, that in that text, the word spirit is
capitalized because that means it's referring to God's Holy
Spirit. That's what God is saying here
is, I will place my Holy Spirit within you. And that, folks,
is the mark of a genuine believer. A truly born-again believer in
Christ is someone who has God's Holy Spirit living specifically
within them. God spells this out in no uncertain
terms in Romans 8 and 9. He says, you, however, are not
in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God
dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the
Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. That doesn't get more
clear than that. And God even calls us, as born-again
believers, He tells us that we're temples of the Holy Spirit, the
actual place where God has decided to take up residence. In 1 Corinthians
6, He says, Do you not know that your body is a temple of the
Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? So the question
is, what's the difference between the Holy Spirit coming on Gideon,
Jephthah, and Samson, and the Holy Spirit coming on Bob, Bill,
Mary, or Sue? Well, the simple answer is one
is temporary and the other is permanent. The temporary empowerment
by the Holy Spirit is always for a particular task that God
has set out for an individual. And again, we're going to look
right now at that Spirit's empowerment in the life of Saul. This is
what Samuel says to Saul in verses 8 through 12. He tells Saul,
go down before me to Gilgal, and behold, I am coming down
to you to offer burnt offerings and to sacrifice peace offerings.
Seven days you shall wait until I come to you and show you what
you shall do." When he turned us back to Leif Samuel, God gave
him another heart. And all these signs came to pass
that day. And when they came to Gibeah,
behold, a group of prophets met him, and the Spirit of God rushed
upon him. And he prophesied among them.
And when all who knew him previously saw how he prophesied among the
prophets, the people said to one another, What has come over
the son of Kish? Is Saul also among the prophets?
And a man of the place answered, And who is their father? Therefore
it became a proverb, Is Saul also among the prophets? So what
happens here is the Spirit of God rushes upon Saul and he begins
to prophesy. And this was so out of the ordinary,
so completely antithetical to the life that Saul had been living,
that it became proverbial. Is Saul among the prophets? Now
it doesn't necessarily mean that Saul was saved or that he was
converted, but it means that God had chosen to use him as
a vessel. And one of the lessons we draw
from this is to understand that whatever task God gives you to
do, he will always empower you to do it in one way or another. Actually, Dave made that point
this morning in the Sunday school class. I mean, Saul was a perfect
example of how that empowering works. Now, whether or not it
was permanent, we just don't know. You see, being born again
means that something of permanence has taken place. God has removed
the heart of stone from your flesh, and he's replaced it with
a heart of flesh, and then he has placed within you his Holy
Spirit. And so the key question that
we need to ask this morning, the question we need to have
answered is, how do we know whether the spirit's indwelling is the
temporary one or the permanent one? I mean, just note what happens
when the real Holy Spirit is permanently installed within
us. This is what God says in Ezekiel.
He says, and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk
in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules." Oh, here's
where the problem lies when it comes to Saul. You see, what
God is saying is when the Holy Spirit enters you, he's going
to change your life, your attitude, your conscience, your thinking.
It's going to be reflected in the life that you live. You know,
it's Jesus who said, the tree is known by its fruit. And what
he's saying is basically a person's life is the primary indicator
of whether or not the Holy Spirit has taken up permanent residence
within him. And when it comes to the life
of Saul, there's a real problem of seeing him as being saved,
as seeing him as someone who had the Holy Spirit permanently
within him, as opposed to someone who was temporarily given a functional
strength and power by God, only because God was using him as
a chosen vessel. And the reason why is because
Saul's life started out well, but it ended up just awful. I mean, his was a life of disobedience,
of attempted murder, not just of David, but of his own son,
Jonathan. He disobeyed constantly, and it was Samuel himself who
castigated Saul for his disobedience by telling him in 1 Samuel 15,
to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of
rams. I mean, at the very end of his
life, a clearly and openly disobedient Saul is literally calling up
spirits from the dead through a medium. And so folks look at
his life, and they see either no fruit at all or fruit that's
twisted, gnarled, and unedible, and they conclude, this guy's
not saved. And again, you can counter by
saying, well, look at David. I mean, David committed adultery.
David committed murder. Ah, but David also repented. And that's something that doesn't
seem to have happened at the end of Saul's life. I mean, there's
no doubt that Saul ended badly. But again, when it comes to his
eternal salvation, it's not for us to say. Mercifully, Jesus
reserved that final judgment for himself alone. And in fact,
he tells us not to engage in determining whether or not any
fellow human being has made it to heaven. Now, probably the
most quoted verse in the entire Bible is the one from Jesus in
Matthew 7, where he says, Judge not, lest you be judged. Now,
folks mistakenly conclude from that single line that Jesus is
forbidding Christians from having any judgments or discernments
about anyone, and that simply isn't true. And it's only five
verses later that Jesus issues another command. This is what
he says. He says, Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not
throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot
and turn to attack you. Well, I got news. It's virtually
impossible to obey this command without exercising some form
of discernment or judgment with regard to what a dog is and what
a pig is in terms of human behavior. You see, when Jesus tells us
to judge not, he's using a particular Greek word that refers to condemnation. It refers to final judgment. God reserves that final judgment
for himself alone, and I'm quite happy about that. And so the question is, was Saul
saved or was he lost? And my answer is, I have no idea.
And furthermore, God says it's not an area that we're supposed
to speculate in. But the real question that all of us need
to ask is, how about me? How do I know if I'm saved or
lost? You see, it's not a matter of
the words you might have said or the good things that you might
have accomplished. It's all a matter of whether or not God's Holy
Spirit has taken up residence inside you. God says clearly
in Romans 8, 9, anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ
does not belong to him. Okay, so how do I know if the
Spirit of Christ is within me? And again, the answer to that,
I think, is relatively simple. Just look at your life. I mean,
Jesus said, a tree is known by its fruit. You look at a tree,
and that's how you know what's empowering the tree. And what
he's saying is, if the Spirit of Christ has entered you, he's
opened your eyes to the enormity of the sacrifice that Christ
has made for you. You know, many of the critics
of Christianity say, how could a good God possibly have created
this world, which is so full of evil? But we see a God who
is willing to fully enter into that very same world with none
of its privileges, with none of its blessings. A God who is
willing to live in that exact same kind of broken world that
we live in and to live in it perfectly so that he could one
day embrace all of its imperfection by paying for it on a cross. And he did it so that we could
by faith claim his perfection as our own and stand before a
holy God worthy of heaven not because of anything that we did,
but because of what he did. And when the spirit of Christ
is within you, you begin to understand what it means to say that God
so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. You also
begin to take on the very qualities of Christ, which we call the
fruit of the spirit, because God's Holy Spirit is now living
inside you. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
goodness, meekness, gentleness, and self-control, they all begin
starting to grow within you. You begin to love what Jesus
loves, you begin to hate what he hates. And the reason why
so many believe that Saul was never saved is because any evidence
of fruit in his life seemed to just disappear as his life went
on. But again, only God knows where
Saul is today. You know, Saul's life is over,
but ours is still unfolding. We still have the privilege,
we still have the opportunity to ask ourselves if we fit the
description of someone who has the spirit of Christ living within
them. It's the most important question
you will ever ask yourself. And if you've never even come
close to this kingdom, the bottom line is exactly what Jesus said
to Nicodemus. You must be born again. You must invite God's Holy Spirit
within you. The good news is all you have
to do is ask. Let's pray. Father, I want to just ask on
behalf of anyone who is sitting here this morning wondering,
does God's Holy Spirit live within me? And Lord, I want to pray
for each and every one of those individuals that has that question
and doesn't feel confident of the answer, because I know, Lord,
that It's simply a matter of asking God, by your Holy Spirit's
power, would you please become my Lord and my Savior? Would
you enter into me, make me a temple of your Holy Spirit? And so,
Lord, I ask this morning that anyone and everyone who has that
doubt, has that question, would be asking that very same thing
of you, that you would take up residence within them. And again,
I pray these things in and through the power of your Holy Spirit.
And I pray it in Jesus' name. Amen. Okay, folks, if you'd all stand,
let me give to you God's blessing. God says, Now to him who was
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. And God's people said, Amen.
The Anointing of Saul
Series 1Samuel
| Sermon ID | 1110241735331850 |
| Duration | 38:55 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | 1 Samuel 9-11 |
| Language | English |
Add a Comment
Comments
No Comments
© Copyright
2026 SermonAudio.