Well, I'm going to start with the sad truth this morning because it really kind of leads into what we're going to look at this morning in 1 Samuel chapter 19. And the sad truth is that sometimes people turn away from God. You know, we don't like that as a church. We don't like it when somebody starts coming and it seems like God's doing a great work in their life and all of a sudden maybe they're not here. But the Bible does say in 2 Timothy 4.10, for Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world, and is departed unto Thessalonica." So there Paul was serving God, obeying God, and Demas, who was a faithful man, all of a sudden he's not serving God anymore, and he goes back to the world and departs from the ministry. In the parable of the sower, I don't know if you ever read that and thought, what is it talking about? Is it talking about unsaved? Is it talking about Christians that apostatize? Or what exactly is it speaking about? And I don't know that I have a definitive answer on that, but certainly it's talking about those that let other things take them away from God. So Matthew chapter 13 and verse 20 says, but he that received the seed into stony places, the same as he that heareth the word and anon with joy receiveth it, Yet hath he no root in himself, but dureth for a while. But when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he is offended. So this is somebody that that comes and God works in their life, but as God works in their life, the persecution comes and somebody says something mean, somebody says something unkind, and because of that, they get offended by that and they turn aside. Verse 22, he also that received seed among the thorns, as he that heareth the word and the care of this world. and the deceitfulness of riches." Okay, they get involved in wanting things instead of God. Choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful. That person is not a fruitful believer. Now, I want to say, praise God. Sometimes there's people that bring forth a hundredfold. That's the good ground. We ought to be the good ground. but we ought not be surprised when somebody turns away. And so the Bible even says in Luke 9, 62, Jesus said unto him, no man having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God. So nobody that gets harnessed up following after God and looks back with longing at the world, kind of like Lot's wife, or looks back and turns back even, is fit for the kingdom of God. That's not what we're supposed to be. We're supposed to be those people that say, like the song says, I've decided to follow Jesus, no turning back. And so some of the people who turn away, you ask yourself, are they saved or they're not saved? Well, the Bible says if they really turned away, they're not saved. 1 John 2, 19 says, they went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us. But they went out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us." So there could be some that are coming along and it seems like God's doing a good work in their life. But then they depart, and they depart not to another good church, but they depart into the world. And it's like they were never saved, and the truth is, they probably weren't ever saved, just like Judas, right? Judas was one of the 12. There were only 12 disciples that were the main group that the Lord chose, and one of those was the betrayer, and was not even born again under the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ himself. Very sadly, he had such a hard heart against God. And so, the point about somebody turning away if somebody does turn away they're not going to find another option there's not another uh savior there's not another cross uh of calvary that by which they could turn to god and and and have salvation so the bible says in hebrews 6 4 for it is impossible for those who are once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come." In other words, they have come, they've drunk of the same fountain that we drink at here at our church, the fountain of the word of God, the fountain of clarity and truth and light and holiness and wisdom. They have that opportunity and the Spirit of God was there convicting and working just like he does in our hearts. But if they've tasted of the good word of God, the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, they're gonna depart, to renew them again unto repentance, it's not possible. Seeing they crucified to themselves the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame. And when we study that passage in Hebrews, it's really speaking about the idea that if you cast off Christ, you're cast off. There's no salvation other than Christ. So if you're gonna walk away from that, you're gonna reject that, what are you turning to? You're turning to something that's gonna destroy you. There's not another option, another sacrifice. And so I wanna warn us today and encourage us as well, never turn away from God. No matter what difficulty you face in your Christian life and experience, never turn away from God. And so you had better determined to turn to God in difficulty every time because the difficulty's gonna come. And so some people face the difficulty And they depart. Other people face the difficulty and they say, no, that's just going to draw me closer to God. I'm going to stick with God. And so always, always go to God. Always seek Jesus in difficulty. Always remember He's our security in time of trouble. He's the one that we should run to. And He's got the solution for every problem. Now there was a difficult day in Jesus' ministry when many disciples turned away from him, and I point this out as a point of interest. There would be some people that would take this way too far because chapter and verse are not part of scripture. They are added by men, but this scripture is John 666, all right? 666, but it says this, from that time, many of his disciples went back and walked no more with them. What a great first to be identified as the mark of men. All right, they walked away from him. Then said Jesus unto the 12, will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. Okay, so those that were close to Jesus, this is how it is. They couldn't conceive how the other group went away, right? The disciples looked at it and said, where should I go? You've got the words of life. And so they're gonna just stick with the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we should do. There's no one else worth turning to other than to Jesus. To whom shall we go thou has the words of eternal life. Now there's a hymn. by J.B. Coates entitled, Where Should I Go? And it says this, living below in this old sinful world, hardly a comfort can afford, striving alone to face temptations soared, where could I go but to the Lord? Where could I go or where could I go? Seeking refuge for my soul, needing a friend to help me in the end, where could I go but to the Lord? Neighbors are kind, I love them every one. We get along in sweet accord. But when my soul needs manna from above, where could I go but to the Lord? You know, to whom shall we flee? I mean, as a believer, understand Jesus is our solace. Solace means comfort or consolation in time of distress or sadness. So if I'm facing a difficulty in the will of God, it ought to be something that drives me to God where I find comfort and encouragement in him. Why? Because my unsaved neighbor, is not going to give me the counsel that I need. I'm not speaking about a neighbor right next to me necessarily, whether or not that is the case, but somebody that's around me, that unsaved friend that I speak to, they're not going to give me the comfort that I need. Ungodly men are not going to bow the knee and say, I'm going to pray for you. I'm going to ask God to get you through that. Carnal friends aren't going to give good advice and say, this is what you need to do. in this situation. So if we turn away from God, we've turned away from everything that we need in that time of difficulty. So again, you're better determined to turn to God in difficulty every time. And that really brings us back into our story now. 1 Samuel chapter 19, and what David is facing from Saul. And so if you remember, we talked last week about David fleeing and Michael helping him escape out of the window, and he is not running because he's scared, but he's running because he's not gonna fight God's anointed. And so he's fleeing from Saul, but he's running to God. My parents right now are down in North Carolina, and they drove down there for Iowa. It was a couple days or three day trip as they took it. And they got in their car up in Des Moines, Iowa, and they headed south. And they programmed their GPS to drive them to eventually Lattimore, North Carolina. And that's where Kaylee is, that's where my sister's family is. And they did that because they wanted to get to them, right? And if you're gonna get to them, you gotta go to where they are. And so if we think about running to God, where do I run to go to God? How do I run to get to God? Well, first of all, you run to godly leaders, run to godly leaders or counselors. David ran to his spiritual counselor. It says in verse 18, so David fled and escaped and he came to Samuel to Ramah. All right, Samuel is a prophet of God. He's a spiritual leader in David's life. So he gets to him. Samuel is the one that had anointed him. He's the one that in David's life, I mean, it was like a pinnacle moment in his life where, I mean, he's just a shepherd. He loves the Lord Jesus and loves God. All right, I know I'm speaking Old Testament, but the Lord was the Lord back then. But I mean, he loved God. He wanted to serve God. He wanted to please God. Samuel called him in before him and amazingly anointed him as the future king. God had no doubt used Samuel to counsel David. The Bible doesn't tell us everything about their relationship or their friendship. Obviously, David knows that he can go to Samuel. Perhaps there's been other times where he's gotten some spiritual counsel, some advice. Samuel, what's going on here? You said I'm the next king. And so if you put yourself in David's shoes and what's going on in his life, you're the next anointed king and nobody knows this but you, maybe your family. So it seems Saul suspects it, especially since God's blessing is off of him. He feels threatened, he feels concerned about that, but nobody knows but David and Samuel in a very select few. You're seeing God open some great doors, but there's extreme adversity. It's going really badly from man's perspective. And so, I think at this point, Satan is whispering things to David. Maybe saying things like, are you really sure that Samuel's right about your future position? I mean, it doesn't seem like it. It seems like everything's going bad. His life is threatened. Do you really think that you're gonna live to be kings? Satan could say something like that. Begin to put some seeds of doubt into David's mind. And so when you begin to take ground for Jesus, this is just a fact that we need to understand. Satan is gonna throw everything at you that he possibly can to try to stop you from doing what God desires you to do. 1 Corinthians 16 verse nine says, for a great door and effectual is open unto me and there are many adversaries. Paul didn't look at it and go, oh, there's too many problems. This can't possibly be the will of God. Paul looked at it and said, there is an awesome open door in front of me, but there is a ton of opposition because of that. Satan is resisting this very heavily. You know, when God called our family to come to Scotland, God didn't, you know, I don't have a missions call. I've got a church planting call. We were praying about where to plant a church. God directed us to Scotland. And so I planned a survey trip to come over here and to take photographs of the area to do a presentation. I came over. also to find a location. We're praying, we came to Kirkcaldy, we knew it was gonna be in the Edinburgh area. It was in Kirkcaldy, we're looking at a map, praying, asking God for wisdom that God directed us to Lonehead, and then eventually directed us to the minors where our church met for 10 years as our church started there. But on that first survey trip, it's only a week long. And so it's not a lot of time and just before I'm getting ready to leave, I got pink eye. It's around Christmas time, all the families together, there's a lot of illness we're sharing. And so I went to the GP and I said, I need some antibiotic. And so he gave me something called Bactrim or something like that. And I'm gonna take that. I started taking that and I flew and I get over and I'm worse. And I got preached on Sunday and I felt horrible, but when I preached, I was fine. God gave me grace to preach. And then I felt horrible again. That's Sunday night was the 31st of December. And I remember it well, because as you came into the new year, all the fireworks were going off around Kirkcaldy and I'm trying to sleep and I can't sleep. And about four in the morning, five in the morning, I'm in the Dilman's bathroom and sitting on the side of the tub, reading my Bible, just reading through the Psalms. And I got to Psalm 142. And it says this, and this is the way I felt. This is what David said. A prayer when he was in the cave. I cried unto the Lord with my voice, and my voice unto the Lord did I make my supplication. I poured out my complaint before him. I showed before him my trouble. When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, then thou knewest my path. In the way wherein I walked have they privily laid a snare for me. I looked at my right hand and beheld, but there was no man that would know me. Refuge failed me. No man cared for my soul. I cried unto thee, O Lord. I said, thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the living. Attend unto my cry, for I am brought very low. Deliver me from my persecutors, for they are stronger than I. Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name. "'the righteous shall compass me about, "'for thou shalt deal bountifully with me.'" And I'm sitting there and it's miserable. I try to go back to sleep. I wake up, my ears are hurting, my throat is hurting, I'm nauseated. And they're like, you gotta go to the GP. And this is Monday, I'm only there through Thursday. So I go to the GP and the lady felt bad for me. I had ear infections in both ears. I had tonsillitis. I had pink eye still. I did a video on that trip and it was up on Calton Hill and the sun, you know, it was low sun, but it was beautiful sunlight while we were here for the pictures and everything I took, but it shadowed the side of my face that had the pink eye, you know, so bad. But I was just miserable and I prayed in that bathroom. I prayed to God and said, God, if this is spiritual warfare, help me to be perfectly well when I get home. Well, that was Sunday night into Monday morning, and I was back Thursday afternoon in the States. I did get penicillin on Monday. I asked when I could see results from that. She said probably in three days. But when I got back, I not only did not have any sign of illness whatsoever, I didn't have jet lag. I didn't, my body didn't have to adjust or anything. I was perfectly well. And I believe wholeheartedly it was spiritual warfare that I was facing as I came on that trip. There have been other times. The day we arrived in Scotland, we got here and Katie was eight months pregnant. And she was completely nauseated. She got sick on her last flight. She was getting sick, sorry to tell you too many details, in the Dilman's car, I think. I mean, she was just completely sick. And then we realized that of our 17 pieces of luggage, one of them was the wrong piece of luggage, even though we had tied like an orange ribbon to our suitcases. Somehow, somebody somewhere in the luggage department just went by those ribbons instead of by the tags because they grabbed somebody else's orange ribbon. And we had 17 pieces, but we had the wrong orange ribbon tied to one of those. So I had to find the wrong suitcase. I'm going through all the baggage tickets trying to find the one that is missing. And Parker climbed a bookshelf. He was two years old. He climbs it. This is our first day. We just arrived and we're shattered. We've flown through the night. He climbs the bookshelf and he falls and he splits his lip open very deep. And so I've got to get in a manual car that I haven't driven a manual except for a couple months, five years before. I've got to get in a manual and I've got to drive through Sheriff Hall roundabout. And I've got to go, I think, to the Royal. I get to the Royal, they say, you've got to go to Sick Kids. I get to Sick Kids, they say, you've got to come back tomorrow. He's going to theater to have that sewn up. So I have to go back the next day, and then I have to drive through horrible fog. I'm just saying. Sometimes you try to do something for God, and you face difficulty, and you gotta go, you know what, that's to be expected. And I don't want you to know this, and it's not planned this way, but we are gonna see this theme in Sunday school, we're gonna see it in the Sunday morning service, and we're gonna see it in our Proverbs tonight. And I think it's appropriate because of some things that we're facing right now in the will of God. And so don't be surprised by that. Run to God. And how do you do that? Get to a spiritual counselor. Go to somebody that knows the word of God, that can encourage you and strengthen you. Don't be somebody that quits and gives up and say, that's it, I'm done. David didn't do that. He didn't go, well, that's it, I don't want this king thing. He ran to Samuel and he says, Samuel, I need help. And so he unburdened his heart to a spiritual counselor. It says that he told him, all that Saul had done to him. You know, they didn't have email. They didn't have mobiles. They didn't have texting. They're a distance apart. They can't communicate. I don't think Samuel was ignorant of this. I think God had probably revealed some of these things that were taking place, but David comes, he just unburdens his heart and says, man, it's not going well. My father-in-law hates me. This is what's happening. And he's just letting that be known to Samuel. You know, as a pastor, I want our church to know that if anybody ever needs to just kind of say, this is what life's like, that in confidentiality, that I'm available, my wife's available, we can sit down and talk about it, pray through it. and ask God for grace. Last thing I want is somebody to be burdened by something and not have an opportunity to get that out and say, this is something that's really troubling me. I need prayer, I need counsel. That's something that a godly pastor desires to do. Jeremiah, obviously, and I want to say this too, there is somebody that we can always unburden our heart to, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. Obviously, it's a good thing for us to run to him in every difficulty and share that with him. The hymn tell it to Jesus by Jeremiah Rankin says are you weary? Are you heavy-hearted tell it to Jesus? Are you grieving over Joyce departed tell it to Jesus alone? Tell it to Jesus. He's a friend. That's well known. You've no other such a friend or brother tell to Jesus alone Do the tears flow down your cheeks unbidden? Have you sins that two men's eyes are hidden? Do you fear the gathering clouds of sorrow? Are you anxious? What shall be tomorrow? Tell it to Jesus. Are you troubled at the thought of dying? Tell it to Jesus. For Christ's coming kingdom are you sighing? Tell it to Jesus alone. So, in time of trouble like that, You do very well to get to spiritual counselors and share and say, this is what's going on in my life. You do well to get to the Lord Jesus Christ himself and just unburden your heart before him. You know, the Bible says, casting all your care upon him for he careth for you. Back when I was a counselor at the Wilds, we had a obstacle course, and one of the things, I've shared this before, but one of the things at the obstacle course was a trust fall, and you'd stand on a platform about that high, turn with your back and your legs locked, and your group would get behind you there, and they'd say, okay, fall, and you'd fall blind, straight back into their arms, and they would catch you. And really, that's a good picture for us this morning as we think about what does it mean to cast all your care upon him. That means cast anything that makes you anxious on God. And so if I'm gonna put it on him, am I gonna be holding it? I'm gonna let it go. I'm gonna let him be burdened about it. I'm gonna let him thinking about it. Now, I've heard it be said, if it's big enough to worry about, it's big enough to pray about. If God cares about the big and the little, God's not up in heaven saying, well, that's too small a request to bring before me. It could be kids' friendships, something happening there. It could be job difficulties, relationship difficulties, sin battles. It could be anything that worries us, troubles us. It could be the battle in Ukraine and Russia, things like that. It just gets in our mind, it's burdening us that we could go to God and say, God, I'm just gonna cast all my care upon you because you care for me. That's amazing to think about today that there's a God in heaven that is over everything, but yet he cares about us today. And he's willing to think about our needs and love us through those situations. So David does that, he gets to godly counsel. And so where do you find God? You find God in godly spiritual leaders, but you also go to the house of God. It says, and he and Samuel went and dwelt in Niath. Okay, Niath was a spiritual retreat. It was there that Samuel established a school of the prophets. And you see some of these ideas of schools of the prophets with Elijah and Elisha and with Samuel, where they're training, ministerial training, men of God to be leaders for God. And so it's a place like that. And so God is going to refresh David through fellowship with his servants. Now, David loved that. That delighted the heart of David. David was a man after God's own heart, so there's nothing he liked more than being with like-minded people that also had a heart for God. If you turn in your Bibles to Psalm chapter 95, we'll look at a Psalm that David wrote. But David loved fellowship with God's people. It says in verse one, oh come, and notice that it's not just David, oh come let me, it's let us. And he'll say it all throughout this psalm. Oh come let us sing unto the Lord. Let us make a joyful noise unto the rock of our salvation. By the way, when we sing hymns, is that just because that's a nice thing to do before the message? It's part of our worship. It's us expressing praise to God. And so, yeah, let's do that, right? Let's encourage ourselves. Let's sing unto God. Verse two, let us come before his presence with thanksgiving. Now we take time to give praises. Should we do that, right? We'll do that as a church. We'll stop and go, hey, anybody have a testimony? Anybody have something that God's encouraged your heart about? Let's do that. Let's give that testimony with thanksgiving. Make a joyful noise unto him with psalms. For the Lord is a great God and a great king above all gods. In his hand are the deep places of the earth. The strength of the hills is his also. The sea is his and he made it. In his hands formed the dry land. O come, let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the Lord, our maker. And so David says, hey, let's do this corporate worship. Let's get together, let's worship God. Now, praise God, we have something today that David didn't have, and that's the local church. We're blessed with Christian fellowship. We're blessed to be able to get together. And I know we're not a huge group this morning, but it's a great thing to get together and to seek the face of God. And it's really refreshing to have that. We have something better than David ever had in his day. You know, sometimes people, they get discouraged, they get in time of difficulty or trial, and you know what they do? They stop going to church. Whatever creeps in there, whatever causes that, I don't know. Maybe it's bitterness against God. Maybe it's dissatisfaction with God. God's not providing. I don't know how that exactly works, but they stop going to church. That's the last thing that you should do. Why? Because that's where you meet with God. That's where the Spirit of God can take the Word of God and apply it to your heart and to your life and help you through the difficulty, help you through the trial that you're facing. It's where Christian believers can come up and say, encourage you and say, I'm praying for you. Pray together like we do at our church and think through life and pray through life together. And so church is the last place we ought to neglect. It's where we seek God. Hebrews 10.25 says, not forsaking the assembling of yourselves together as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching. All right, there ought to be a greater desire. Listen, the day of the Lord, is that nearer or farther away than it's ever been? I know that's obvious. And so we always say, by God's grace, I'm gonna be there. And I'm preaching to the choir, right? But we gotta say, I'm gonna be there. I'm gonna be there if I can. Sunday school, Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. I need to get together with my brothers in Christ. I need to be faithful to the house of God because I need that kind of fellowship. You know, Nioth, again, is a place of spiritual refreshment, a spiritual retreat. We love camping, you know, men's camp. We love that time to get that focused time under the word of God. It's refreshing to come together, be with other believers that love the Lord. We need that fellowship time. We've had, what, three fellowships in the last two weeks as a church where we've been able to eat together and talk together. That's a great thing. That's a very needful thing. And so there's no doubt we're gonna face difficulty, but we oughta let that difficulty turn us to God and say, you know what, I gotta get some spiritual counsel, get some encouragement through this. I gotta get to the house of God and be refreshed in my walk with God. And so seek out godly counsel and then seek out spiritual refreshment. I don't know how this happened, but I'm done early. I don't know why. Don't get used to this. I kind of hate to end here 10 minutes early, but we'll enjoy some fellowship time anyway. So let's pray and ask God's blessing on his word. Father, thank you for the grace that you give. I'm thankful that David didn't quit. It was tough, very tough what he's facing. We can't begin to understand what he's facing. His marriage is rough because he's separated from his wife and his father-in-law hates him. He's just trying to obey God and please God. He's getting more and more enemies. It's not going well and Samuel is who he needed just to encourage him and strengthen him and get with that good fellowship. Father, we pray that we do that as a church. We want to be iron sharpening iron. We want to be building up and edifying one another and strengthening each other's hands. Father, if there's a great difficulty that someone in church is facing, we want to be aware of that so that we could help them through it and pray through it with them. Help people not to carry burdens silently and not speak about them if there's a real difficulty that's in their life. Father, I pray that we just open up and share our burdens and help carry one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. And so, Father, thank you for the Word of God that we've been able to look at this morning. May the Spirit of God just bless these truths to our hearts in time of difficulty. Seek God, get spiritual counsel, get to the house of God, and just be faithful. It's in Christ's name we pray, amen.