Well, as we get underway here, we've got a lot of ground to cover. And so I would just start us off by praying. So let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, be with me now as I perform a task that I'm unfit to do. Lord, I am a broken vessel, and so Lord, I just lean, I stand upon you, your word that endures forever. Lord God, may you be heard today. May even imperfect vessels preach sermons that honor and glorify you and bless your church. And so, Lord God, just be with me now as we turn to your word. Give us ears to hear your mighty word. Give us hearts that receive it. Give us eyes to see and adore that which you have for your people this morning, Lord God. We need you. We need you every hour. We need you every moment. So be with us even here now as we receive your word. God, we love you. It's in your son's precious name that we pray and through the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen. And as we come here, and as we get underway, just a little bit of a review of the sermon series that we're doing right now. We're doing Advent, and so as in this Advent season, our sermon series is God With Us. And so we've already looked at that in a couple of ways. The first week, we discussed God With Us Lost, and Levi preached a sermon about how Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, losing the presence of God. and how immediately that was followed with the promise of God to Adam and Eve that one day their offspring, the seed of the woman, would one day make way back to the presence of God. And then last week, we looked at that promise and we examined it a little more closely. We scoped in a little bit and we saw that that promise that God has given to His people, it takes specific shape. And part of what we saw from Genesis 22 last week was that God will provide the necessary sacrifice to grant access to Him in His presence once again. And so today when we come here, just to give you a preview of this sermon, it's called God With Us Prefigured. God With Us Prefigured. And that brings us to our sermon today. So if you've got your Bibles, open to 2 Chronicles chapter 6. 2 Chronicles chapter 6. And one of the central aims of this sermon, it's kind of already been accomplished in the other two sermons, which kind of takes a little bit of ease off my mind, but it's that Jesus has already been prefigured in that garden moment where a sacrifice was made for Adam and Eve to cover their sin. We see Christ there, and we also see Christ in that story that we saw last week of Abraham sacrificing Isaac and the sacrifice being supplied for And so again, we see Jesus prefigured in that story as well, but for the kids, right? So prefigured is kind of like, I don't know, what does that mean, prefigured? I have no idea what that means. So just to kind of bring it down to your level, which that's my level too. So I, you know, I used to live in Orlando, Florida, and that's where Disney World is. Mickey Mouse, he lives there. One of the things about Disney World, if you've never been before you go, you get super hyped. You get super amped because it's like, oh, this is going to be awesome. Disney World's amazing. But even when you're driving out there, you're a mile out and you start seeing these big signs of all the characters and yada, yada, yada. And it's like, man, these signs, they're awesome. There's the characters, Goofy and Donald and Mickey and yada, yada, yada. They're just signs, right? Like, no one actually, oh, see the sign? Let's stop, get out of the car, and hang out for hours around the sign of the thing, right? No. It's a sign that's pointing you, saying, hey, Disney World is drawing near. Like, you are drawing close to Disney World. And so when we talk about prefigure, Prefiguring is just those signs, like that Disney World sign that points to the king that's coming, or to the kingdom, the magical kingdom that's coming of Disney World. These signs, what we're looking at, a prefiguring are these signs, these types of Christ. They are Christ before Christ. They point to Christ when He is to come. And so today, God with us prefigured, we're going to do this. We're going to look at the lives of two kings, two of the most well-known kings, David and Solomon. We're going to look at David and Solomon who point us to Jesus. They point us to Jesus. And sometimes a preacher, you kind of bury the lead, you preach a little inductively where it's like you're going to go through all the information and then boom, punch you at the end with the whole dominant thought, the big picture kind of hits you at the end. I'm telling you guys right up front, this is the sermon. If you're going to tune me out the rest of it, you have to hold on to this. This is what you need to hold on to from this sermon. Christ is the incarnate one, God with us, Jesus, who is the one who subdues all of the enemies of God's people and he gives them peace. That's the sermon. Christ subdues our enemies and brings us peace. And so we're gonna see that, how David, he prefigures so vividly in our text, in the text that we'll be looking at, he prefigures Jesus in defeating all of Israel's enemies. And Solomon prefigures Christ in that he's bringing a peace, a peace to all of his people. So through David and through Solomon, we see Jesus's victory over all the enemies of God and the unparalleled peace with which he brings his people. And so that brings us to 2 Chronicles 6, verses 1 through 11. Hear now the word of the Lord. Then Solomon said, the Lord has said that he would dwell in thick darkness, but I have built you an exalted house, a place for you to dwell in forever. Then the king turned around and blessed all the assembly of Israel while all the assembly of Israel stood. And he said, Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who with his hand has fulfilled what he promised with his mouth to David my father, saying, Since the day that I brought my people out of the land of Egypt, I chose no city out of all the tribes of Israel in which to build a house, that my name might be there. And I chose no man as prince over all my people Israel. But I have chosen Jerusalem, that my name may be there. And I have chosen David to be over my people Israel. Now it was in the heart of David, my father, to build a house for the name of the Lord, the God of Israel. But the Lord said to David, my father, whereas it was in your heart to build a house for my name, You did well that it was in your heart. Nevertheless, it is not you who shall build the house, but your son who shall be born to you shall build the house for my name. And as I fulfilled his promise that he made, for I have risen in the place of David, my father, and sit on the throne of Israel as the Lord promised. And I have built the house for the name of the Lord, the God of Israel. And there I have set the ark in which is the covenant of the Lord that he made with the people of Israel." Thus closes the reading of God's Word. It endures forever. And so, okay, I've just dropped you right into the middle of something. Okay, like that text we're just dropping in kind of near the end of the story. So I want to add some surrounding context to kind of bring us up to code. So if we were to go back just a page, just 2 Chronicles 5, we would see that the ark has been brought into the temple. Solomon has just talked about that. And so the ark of the covenant, the presence of God, it is dwelling with the people. And this is why Solomon has this moment where he's blessing the people and they're celebrating. And part of the context too is that what our text that we just read, it's Solomon looking back to what God has already fulfilled. And he's fulfilled two promises. That's what Solomon is talking here. Two promises fulfilled. First is that God would dwell with his people. We read that. We see that all over the place. God really does dwell with his people. The ark is here. God truly is here. And the second promise, so God is with us. We've got the temple. And the second is that God promised to establish the house of David on the throne forever. And so these two institutions, like every guy knows this, like before you leave the house, there's like a litmus test, if you know you're doing the right, like if you've got everything you need, phone, wallet, keys, that's the litmus test. If you've got that, you've got it made, right? Like you've got everything you need. And for Israel, their phone, wallet, keys is the temple and the monarchy. If they've got those things in place, if Israel has those things in place, Everything's going to be fine. We're going to make it. Everything will be fine. And that's why when eventually, when Israel is in exile, that's why they have no peace there. Our temple is destroyed. We don't have our land. There's no David, there's no king of David, no son of David to reign. What do we have? We have nothing. So these are, this is just a little bit of the background we need to go forward to truly appreciate where we're going. So in 2 Chronicles chapter 6, these two pillars, the kingdom and the temple, they're cemented. They're here. They're there for the people of God. And this is a high moment for Israel. This is one of the all-time highs that this nation has. They've got their king, they've got their temple, things are great. But how did we get here? How did we get to this point? And so to do that, we're gonna look at David and Solomon. We're gonna take a look at David and Solomon, and first we'll take that look at David and see how David subdues the enemies of God's people. And so, The most common story about David that everyone knows, David and Goliath. We're going to take a look at that first. And so we see right out the gate of the David story is that he is a king who will defeat the enemies of God's people. And we all know the story, right? Actually, it starts before that. It starts with Saul and that false start that exists with Saul. Saul is that king who is picked because the people have their priorities messed up, right? The people want a king so they can be like the nations. They want to be just like the rest of the world. God has called them to be holy and they want to be like the rest of the world. And so the Israelites, we know the story, they're at war with the Philistines. They're at each part of their own valley and they're looking in and there's a war being waged. And Goliath, right, we know him, the strap giant, amazing armor. You all know the story. And so in there though, he's talking all kinds of smack. He's talking all kinds of smack about Israel. And when everyone else is afraid, everyone is terrified. But when David hears this, when David hears about Goliath, he says, what happens to the guy who kills him? He doesn't share the fear, the dread, all of the anxiety that comes with Saul and the rest of Israel. No. He asks the question, what do we get if we kill him? And so what makes him so courageous? What makes him so courageous that he can just take this guy? Well, it's funny when he actually begins his dialogue with Saul, where does he find his source of his comfort? He finds it in the past accomplishments, those things that which God has already granted him victory over. He says, that giant? I mean, I've already killed bears. I've killed lions. I mean, I was with my dad. We did work. We would be with the flocks. And yeah, I killed a couple of bears and a couple of lions. What's one more giant? What's a giant to me? And so Saul's problem, and everyone else's, is that the earthly circumstances, a giant and the mighty army of the Philistines, it causes them great dread and fear. Not so with David, right? He knows that it's not the Israelites, small and puny, versus the Philistines, giant and mighty. He knows it's the Philistines, puny and tiny, versus God Almighty. And so David has courage, he has faith. And by faith, David kills Goliath and he delivers the people of God from their enemies. But this is just the appetizer, really. This is the first story we get of David conquering the enemies of God's people, but it's just the appetizer. Because he has victory over all the enemies of Israel. He has victory over all nations. Part of the reason that the Lord rejected Saul was God's call for Israel to eliminate all their enemies. If you guys were to go back to the book of Joshua and the conquest, and remember Moses, he can't make it, say, you can't go Moses, it has to be Joshua. And the call for Joshua is to go into the land of Canaan and to remove all the Canaanites. Not just some of them, remove all of them. And Joshua does a great job of that. But he doesn't get all of them. And that cycle that you get through the book of Judges, where there's the spiritual decay, the cycles of judge after judge after judge, and apostasy after apostasy after apostasy, is because Israel really never purged all of the things that they were supposed to get rid of. They never got rid of all the temptations of the Canaanite religion. And so, Saul also continues in this wake of failing at this mission that God has given to his people, that God has given to his leaders, which is to eliminate all the enemies of God's people. And this is what qualifies David, because in 1 Chronicles 18, we get this awesome summary statement of what David's kingdom was marked by. And so what we hear in 1 Chronicles 18 is that, and this shouldn't surprise us, when we read there that David, he defeats the Philistines, the Edomites, the Moabites, the Ammonites, and especially the Amalekites. Saul was told to conquer the Amalekites, and if you read 1 Samuel 15, it's that story of he actually lets the king, his name's Agag, king of the Amalekites, he lets Agag live, and he actually takes a lot of the best livestock so that he can sacrifice it to the Lord. And Samuel, David's priest, or yeah, the last of the judges, if you will, he is told that God is very displeased with this, that you were supposed to remove all the enemies of God, yet here Saul is leaving one alive. And because Saul fails this mission, he's rejected by God. God wants a man after his own heart. And so David is the king who subdues all the enemies of God's people, even the Amalekites. And that's why this 1 Chronicles 18, it capstones with this statement. It says, the Lord gave victory to David wherever he went. And so why, if David is this one who subdues all the enemies of the Lord and the Lord's people, why is it not David who gets to build the temple? Why not David? 2 Chronicles, the text we read, chapter 8, verses 8 and 9 says, But the Lord said to David, my father, whereas it was in your heart to build a house for my name, you did well that it was in your heart. Nevertheless, it is not you, David, who shall build the house, but your son who shall be born to you shall build the house for my name. So why is David the one to build it? It is not the one to build the temple. David actually explains this to Solomon in 1 Chronicles. At the end of 1 Chronicles 22, David is speaking to Solomon and he says, I had it in my heart to build a house to the name of the Lord my God. But the word of the Lord came to me saying, you have shed so much blood and have waged great wars. You shall not build a house to my name on the earth. Behold, a son shall be born to you who shall be a man of rest. I will give him Rest from all his surrounding enemies. His name shall be Solomon and I will give him peace and quiet to Israel in his days. He shall build a house for my name. He shall be my son and I will be his father and I will establish his royal throne in Israel forever. And so David is not the one to build the temple because he's waged too much war. And so this moves us from David, he is the king who subdues all of God's people's enemies, and this brings us to Solomon, a prince of peace. And so the temple being built, one of the things it's indicating to all of us, what it's indicating to the people of Israel and to us now, is that temple is built because it is a marker of peace. It is saying all of God's enemies have been removed, and so God's temple can now be built. And it's a marker also, not of just the peace there, but yes, that all enemies have been removed. Though David did not build the temple, it was him who saw that it was right for God to dwell, not in a tent, not in a tabernacle. So David, he recognizes that the Lord deserves so much more than what we can offer. But the temple was finished under Solomon, whose reign had rest from all of God's enemies. Where God is, where God truly is, where He is present, there is unparalleled peace. And so that's why Solomon's reign is this one marked with unparalleled peace. And just like we had with David, an example of Goliath is an early person who comes and deals with David and points that David would have victory over his enemies. There's a character in the book of 2 Chronicles that comes, and it's very interesting, it's kind of very mysterious. In 2 Chronicles chapter 9, we hear about the Queen of the South, or later known as the Queen of Sheba. And so 2 Chronicles 9, it says plenty about their interaction. And we could spend a lot of time there. We don't know exactly why it is that she wanted to go. Maybe there's some personal conflict that she needed wisdom for. But one of the reasons she goes is clearly stated, which is that she hears of the wisdom of Solomon. She hears of the greatness of Israel. And so she goes there. And there's a reason why she doesn't go there when David is king. Right now, we know there's turmoil going on in Palestine, the Middle East. Some people may know people who their plans to travel to the Jerusalem area has been put off because of the conflict that's going there. Well, why is that? It's because it's not safe to go there right now. where this woman from the South, part of what we're supposed to know, where is Sheba? Sheba is like the furthest Southern point of the Middle East, like the best we can put together. And so this person's coming from a very, very far away, especially in the ancient world, coming from a very far place. Of course, I'm only gonna make it up there because of the peace that is there, the renown of this place. And the renown of this place is the peace that it offers. And so she comes and when she goes there, she cannot believe the wisdom of Solomon. She cannot believe just the riches of the temple, the gold, the precious stones, those things that are markers of God's very presence. She's overwhelmed by them. In fact, the text says that it actually left her breathless. It says that there was no more breath in her. And so she saw the riches of the temple and the joy of God's people, and it moved her to give gifts to Solomon. But King Solomon, He receives the gifts, but what he does in turn is he gives to the Queen of Sheba, the Queen of the South, all that she desired and more. And she was blessed with whatever she asked. And so this peace, why are we using her as an example? The peace which with that the temple ushered, that Solomon ruled over, that this Prince of Peace, his rule, it draws the nations. It draws the nations to this Prince of Peace. They are drawn to the presence of God. And so, and it's not just that. If we continue to read in 2 Chronicles 9, we would see that it's not just the Queen of Sheba, it's all nations, all the enemies, all those enemy nations, that they are caught up with this Prince of Peace, that this temple has been built, and the beauty of it, and the wisdom that he has. There's a reason why the Queen of Sheba goes under this rain. It's this peace that is there. And so she sees the riches of God's presence and the joy of God's people and it moves her to give gifts. It moves her to come close, to draw near to the presence of God. Abraham was told that his nation would be a blessing to the nations. We hear about that back in Genesis, that his people were blessed to be a blessing to the nations. And this is an outworking of a partial fulfillment of that word to Abraham, is that God's people will be a blessing to the nations. And so much like David's defeat of Goliath, marking the victory that David had over all the enemies of God, the Queen of Sheba, it marks that the Prince of Peace would draw the nations to himself. And so if the Queen of Sheba, the most random, the furthest person from God, is drawn to his presence, then God will draw to himself people of all nations. It is this son of David, Solomon, who brings peace to the people of God. But you may be saying to yourself, you know your Bibles, right? You may be saying, this all sounds too good. This sounds too good to be true. How can the author of Chronicles paint such a picture, such a rosy picture of David and Solomon? There's a lot we could say about that and I would encourage you to come to Sunday school where we'll be talking about that in much more detail. Shameless plug. But what we will say here now is the author of Chronicles, he knows all the warts of David and Solomon. He knows all the things they've done. Is he trying to pull the fleece over his audience eyes? Is he trying to tell them something that maybe I can sneak this past them? No, no. And we'll have more to say about that in Sunday school, of course. But he knows about Bathsheba. He knows, you know about Bathsheba. He knows that his original audience knows about Bathsheba. He knows about Uriah. We all know about Uriah. We know about the census that David took that demonstrated his faithlessness as to whether God would be with him in his battles. He knows, we all know about Solomon's many wives and the apostasy that accompanies that, the idolatry that came with the many wives of Solomon. We all know that Israel and Judah, that they're going to be dragged off into exile. We all know this. And the Chronicler knows their baggage, and he's not trying to pull the fleece over their eyes. He knows that the best of men are men at best. And so why is he giving this very sanitized version of David and Solomon? Because the chronicler is trying to communicate to his audience that these kings at their best point, they point not backwards, they point forward. David and Solomon did some amazing things, but neither of them were the king of kings and the Lord of lords. That king, the idealized king, this king who defeats all the enemies of God's people, this king who reigns in peace over all of his people is still to come. Now, you all know this, right? We've all come from our perspective of being New Testament era Christians, and we all live in church, so we all know who is that king? Sunday school answer, Jesus. Thank you. It's Christ, and he is both this conquering king, and he's also the prince of peace. And so the one whom David wrote of in Psalm 110, the most quoted Psalm in all the New Testament. See, David knew that a greater son was to come. This is the one, Jesus, who Paul wrote of in 1 Corinthians 15, 24, and 25. Then comes the end when Jesus delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. So Christ is this conquering king, but he is the peace of God. In Romans 5, 1, Paul says of Christ, Christ has conquered our enemies. He says, therefore, by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. And this is the one, this Jesus, is of whom the prophet Isaiah said, for to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. It is this Jesus who, if we had more time we can go on it, but the book of Revelation, chapters 19 and 20, he is the one who's the rider on the white horse, the one who makes war, the one whose fire has flames of fire in his eyes, whose robe is dipped in blood, who the armies of heaven follow in full array, the one who treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God, and on his robe is the name written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Jesus, it is him who seizes Satan and throws him away forever. It is him, Jesus, this one who destroys all of God's people's enemies. It is this Jesus who brings and reigns in peace, which wipes away every tear from his people's eyes and makes death no more. He brings a peace that contains no mourning, no crying, no pain anymore. And that's all great, that's all great. Praise be to Jesus for that. Praise be to Jesus for all that he has done in defeating our enemies and bringing us to peace. But what does it mean for you? Like right here, right now, you, Christ the King, here today. Two things, two things I want us to process, and maybe you're in one of these two camps. Maybe you're doing just well, you're doing well and dandy, and maybe you're weary, okay? You're probably in one of these two camps. So for those who are doing well right now, life is going dandy, things are great, blessed beyond measure. Those who are doing well, oh Christian, may your life so reflect that you dwell with God that you draw people to him. Much like Solomon in that reign of peace, that people hear of the goodness of the presence of God and they would be drawn to him. Know Christ in such a way that when you're interacting with people, that they would know Christ. There's something special about you that someone dwells in you that they are drawn to Christ. And please, also, if you're doing well, praise and worship Him now as we go forward with singing songs and praying with one another. But if you're not doing well, if you're weary, if you're here and you're heavy-hearted, those who are weary, I'd ask you, what battles are you waging? What right now do you need peace from? Loneliness, anxiety, self-loathing thoughts, battling fears of rejection or embarrassment. I didn't get that thing that I wanted. I'm not the person I want to be. Maybe you feel like I'm failing as a parent. Maybe you feel like, I don't know if I'm a good son or daughter. Maybe you're worried about finances, it's Christmas time, we're gonna have presents under the tree. Lots of struggles we face. Maybe you're in the trenches of besetting sin. And maybe it's a sin that you've been coddling for some time. Something you've waged battle against for years. You need to hear this message, that Christ has defeated all of your enemies. Christ right now sits victorious in heaven right now. Approach Him in prayer. Approach Him in the fellowship with other believers. Approach Him, when we take things like the Lord's Supper, it's not this week, because we don't have a teaching elder here, next week. Approach Him in things. If you don't know, but here, if you're here today and you don't know Jesus, then approach Him. Approach the King of Kings. Approach Him. Pray to Him. What must I do to know you? What must I do to know the conquering King and the Prince of Peace? So bring your battles to the Lord of lords and the King of kings. Christ subdues all our enemies and he brings us peace. God with us. Amen. Let's pray. God, you are a good and mighty God. You are so wonderful to your people. You bless us immensely in ways that we don't know all the things and all the ways that you bless us because our blessings are so many. But Lord, we thank you now for Christ, God with us, who has come, who you have delivered to us, born incarnate to the Virgin Mary. We praise you God for this Christ who has subdued all of our enemies. I pray now that those who are struggling, that we would lean on Christ, that we would look to him, the author and perfecter of our faith, and that we would cry out to him for all the help. He is our conquering king. And I thank you, Lord, for the peace that he has for his people. Lord, may it dwell richly in the hearts of these people who hear this word now. Lord God, be with us as we continue to praise you now and forevermore. Amen.