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China Grove now, and I appreciate
what God has done for them. I've had the privilege, well,
I'm not sure it's a privilege. Some of it is, some of it's not.
I've had the opportunity. I've had the opportunity of ordaining
several folks in the ministry. Opportunity. And a lot of times
those guys will take off and head in a different direction.
Sometimes they'll take off and forget all about you, you know,
and you've poured your time and energy and effort into them.
And then there are those few, but like Brother Moss and Sister
Alicia that have stayed in contact with us down through the years
and loved us and they are very much appreciated by me. Am I all right? Did I lose my
microphone? Where'd it go? I don't even know where the thing
is at. Oh, it's down here. It's around my holster. Amen. All right, there you go. All
right, so am I good now? All right, can they hear me out
there in the world? All right, amen. Let's go to
the book of First Chronicles tonight, the book of First Chronicles
and chapter number 21. I'm really seriously gonna hurry
up and I'm gonna get out of the way and Brother Winslow is coming
to preach, I believe, and he is a He's a dear man of God,
and a precious fella, and a great preacher. And he hates it when
you say stuff like that about him, but it's just the truth.
He's a good man, and I appreciate it. I look across the room tonight,
and there's a lot of men in here, a lot better men than I am, and
no lies to tell about that, good men who have just been faithful
and true down through the years. And Brother Ron Young is sitting
here tonight, These are men that I'm not being fake humble. I don't deserve to just carry
their coat. These are good men that love
the Lord and have been faithful and true down through the years,
and I'm very grateful for them, and I'm very thankful that the
Lord's allowed my life to cross with theirs. Well, you've got
this business up around here on the thing about contending
for the faith. I heard Dr. James Crumpton many
years ago make this statement. He was preaching about the Bible
and he said, he said, some have said, Dr. Crumpton, do you defend
the Bible? He said, no more than you would
defend a lion. He said, you don't defend the
lion, you just turn him loose and let him do his thing. And
that's what you do with the Word of God. There's no sense of just
bandering back and forth in needless arguments as guys have done in
the last several months, which get you nowhere. Just turn the
Word of God loose and let it do its job. It'll get the job
done. Let's talk about the Word of
God tonight for just a bit, if you don't mind. What do you know
about it anyhow? I mean, a lot of you, I'm a King
James fella. Well, you haven't even read all
the words in it, and you're trying to claim that you're a King James
man or woman. You don't even have any idea
what's in the thing. Do you even know what's in it? I mean, there's
66 books in that library that's in your lap. You've got 39 Old
Testament books and 27 New Testament books. You've got 1,189 chapters
that you should have visited on numerous occasions. Numerous
occasions. There are, I think there's 31,102
verses in your Bible, and there's 788,280 words in your Bible. And you ought to be acquainted
with every single one of them in the Word of God. I finished
the Word of God twice this year. I finished it for the second
time last week. And my intention is to just, I try to read, I
don't know, 15, 20 chapters a day or more. And I don't wanna say
I get it done every day, but I try to. You say, well, I just
don't have the time. That's why I get up at four o'clock
in the morning. And that's why I get up at 4.30 in the morning.
I get up at ungodly hours so that I can have time to put the
Word of God into my heart and into my life. The very center
of the Word of God is found in that Psalms 103, verse one and
two. That's the center of your book.
And those two verses say, bless the Lord, O my soul, and all
that's within me, bless His holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and forget not all of His benefits. There's not really a single,
a central word in the Bible. There's a central four-word phrase. That four-word phrase is, bless
His holy name. That's the center of your Bible,
bless His holy name. Well, when you consider what
he said about his name in relationship to the book in which his name
is mentioned in the center of it, Jesus, or the Lord said through
the psalmist in Psalm 138 too, that he has magnified the book. He's magnified his word above
his name. In other words, he would rather
cease to be called whatever name you choose for God in the Old
and New Testament, whether it's Jehovah, or Elohim, or Jehovah
Shammah, Jehovah Shalom, Jehovah Nissi, Jehovah Sid Canu, or Jesus
Christ, Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father,
Prince of Peace, whichever name you choose. He said, I'd rather
cease to be called all of those names than for this word of God
not to be accurate and for it not to be correct. He said, I've
upheld my book over my name. And you would be surprised how
many preachers, we'll use the term loosely, grace our pulpits
who have never read their Bible through once. And instead of
studying it through and preaching it line upon line, they find
a cute phrase or a cute word or a cute thought. And I heard
a man years ago, and everybody just raved at the meeting and
I was about to puke. He crawled into the book of Song
of Solomon and he got to reading about the garden of the fruits
and nuts. And he said, in my 40 years of
ministry, I wanna preach on the fruits and nuts that I have met
in the last 40 years. And he took 40 minutes and preached
about nothing. Now my time is more valuable
than that. Years ago, I saw John Phillips
in a meeting, and of course, sometimes when he would come
to those meetings, he would carry his Bible, but he would carry
a stack of books with him as well. And while he was in the
meeting, he might be listening to a preacher taking notes, or
he might have laid his Bible down and then picked up a book
and then read the book. And the reason he was reading
the book, one person asked him, why do you lay your Bible down
when somebody's preaching and read the book? He said, I'm an
old man. And he said, there's some people, I just don't have
time to waste with them. And there's some people, I'm
being honest with you, there's some preaching that's a waste to listen
to. I'm just being honest. But you got a good Bible preacher
here, and he invites some good Bible preachers in. And I wanna
look, and Brother Tommy's coming, I don't know of a greater man
in the Psalms than Brother Tommy. I want you to look at First Chronicles
with me, and I wanna give you a thought, that's all, just a
thought. And I want to give it to you.
And I want you to ruminate on this thought. I want you to put
it in your soul and in your spirit. And I want you to chew on it
for the next several days. I want you to read with me in
verse one. The Bible said, and Satan stood up against Israel. And here's what Satan did. Satan
provoked David to number Israel. And the Bible said that David
said to Joab and to the rulers of the people, go, number Israel. from Beersheba even to Dan, that's
just basically within the confines of our boundaries, go number
the people from Beersheba to Dan and bring the number of them
to me that I may know it. Over a million people, about
a million, 300,000 men were numbered in this census, if you will.
Look down at verse seven. The Bible said, and God was displeased. with the, he says that God was
displeased, God was displeased with David, with this thing,
therefore he smote Israel. And David said unto God, I have
sinned greatly, because I have done this thing. But now I beseech
thee, do away the iniquity of thy servant, for I have done
very foolishly. And the Lord spake unto Gad,
David's seer, a prophet, saying, and here's what he said, Go,
tell David, saying, Thus saith the Lord, I offer thee these
three things here. He said, Choose thee one of them,
that I may do it unto thee. It's amazing how often God gives
people choices in the Word of God. I mean, it doesn't matter
really what Reformed theology says, you just have to read through
the Word of God, and you find God giving people choices about
a lot of stuff. I'm glad I'm not just a pawn on a chessboard,
hallelujah. So the Bible went on to say that
he gave them this choice. Look at verse 12. Either three
years' famine or three months to be destroyed before thy foes,
while that the sword of thine enemies overtake thee. He said,
or else three days, sword. of the Lord, even the, here's
the word, pestilence. And I believe, if my memory serves
me right, in the parallel chapter, which is 2 Samuel 24, I believe
it's called a plague there. He said, this pestilence of the
land, the angel of the Lord destroying throughout all the coast of Israel,
now therefore advise thyself what word I shall bring again
to him that sent me. David said, Gad, I'm in a great
strait, I don't know what to do. He said, let me fall now
into the hand of the Lord, and here's why he said that, for
greater are his mercies. He hadn't changed, by the way.
but let me not fall in the hand of man. And so verse 14 said
that a pestilence came, right? He sent a pestilence unto them. Now in verse number 22, this
pestilence is also referred to as a plague. Look down in verse
22. Then David said to Ornan, grant me the place of this threshing
floor that I may build an altar therein unto the Lord that he
said, thou shalt grant it me for the full price. That, here's
the word again, that the plague, or pestilence, may be stayed
from the people. Let's pray just for a second,
and as I said a minute ago, I'm not gonna be long. I wanna give
you a thought, and I really want it to stick to it. No fancy points,
you can put your pen down, there's nothing to write. But it'll be
something to remember in our hearts. Father, I thank you for
this day. And I want to thank you for your blessings on our
life. I thank you for Brother Dotson. And Father, he's one
of my dearest friends in the world. And I thank you for him.
Thank you for this church and these dear men that are here.
and our friends that have gathered. Now bless us now, Father, in
Jesus the Lord's name we pray, amen and amen. As we consider
the story tonight, David is a good man, there's no doubt about that.
The Bible said that David is a man after God's own heart.
I think that's correct, right? David's a man after God's own
heart. We've got a lot of the Psalms from David. We have David
approaching God about numerous things in his life, and God intervening
on David's behalf. David has quite an unusual relationship,
he and the Lord. The truth is, I'm just a logical
fella. When I look logically at what
King Saul did against God and what King David did in his personal
life, I personally, I'm not God now, I personally don't see Saul's
transgressions as being as severe as adultery and murder in the
life of David. The difference was not in the
sin that was committed, but rather in the attitude of the individuals
once the sin had been committed. And David had this real sensitive
heart toward God that even though he did some very egregious things,
he repented and he got right quickly with the Lord while Saul
justified everything basically that he did. Now, in consideration
of that with David, here's something to think about. When David is
the king of the nation of Israel, he's a man after God's own heart.
But David is a man with some issues not unlike most of the
men in Israel, most of the kings in Israel. Now, go with me to
the book of Deuteronomy, if you would, in your scriptures. Deuteronomy
and chapter number 14. Deuteronomy chapter number 14
is where I want you to look tonight, just for a moment, and I want
to share these little things with you if you don't mind. Deuteronomy
chapter number 14. Now, when Israel was still in
the wilderness, And God was giving Moses direction in regard to
the law. God gave the law to Moses in
regard to the nation of Israel going forward. Even reaching
into decades to come because God and His sovereignty knew
that Israel would have a king. Now, when he revealed to Moses
through the law that Israel would have a king, he laid down a set
of qualifications for the king. Now, note the qualifications
of the king of Israel beginning in verse 14 of chapter 17. The
Bible said, "'When thou art come unto the land which the Lord
thy God giveth thee, and shalt possess it, and shalt dwell therein,
and shalt say, I will set a king over me, like all the nations
that are about me, Thou shalt in any wise set him king over
thee, whom the Lord shall choose one from among thy brethren,
shalt thou set king over thee, that thou mayest not set a stranger
over thee which is not thy brother. But he, the king," note verse
16, it begins his qualification. He said, he, the king, shall
not multiply horses to himself. Now, it wasn't that he couldn't
have horses. He could have horses, it was
where he got them from. Look at the verse. He said, not
horses, nor cause the people to return to Egypt to see the
end that he should multiply horses for as much as the Lord has said
unto you, ye shall henceforth return no more that way. Egypt
was known as the horse capital of the world. And he said, having
a horse isn't an issue, it's your people going back to Egypt
and getting a heart after Egypt that's the issue. So the king
is not to multiply horses to himself. And the next qualification
is found in verse number 17. He said, neither shall he multiply
wives to himself that his heart turn not away, neither shall
he greatly multiply to himself silver and gold. Now we have
two qualifications in verse 17. The qualification first mentioned
is that he is to be in a marriage of monogamy, not polygamy. He
said he's to be a one-woman man. He's to be a one-woman man. He's
not to have a harem or a multiplicity of wives unto himself. He's to
have one woman, and that's all he's to have. The next qualification
that was given here was that he was not to multiply to himself
silver or gold. In other words, his heart would
be turned toward wealth, prosperity, and riches, and it would be turned
from God, and he would not have to rely upon God. And so he wasn't
saying that he couldn't live comfortably. He's saying that
he was not to live in the lap of luxury. And so these were
the three qualifications, only there's four. The fourth qualification
is found beginning in verse 18. And it shall be when he sitteth
upon the throne of his kingdom, that here's what he shall do,
that he shall write, write him a copy of this law in a book
out of that which is before the priests, the Levites. and it
shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of
his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God, to keep
all the words of this law and the statutes to do them. that
his heart be not lifted up above his brethren and that he turn
not aside from the commandment to the right hand or to the left
to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom and he
and his children in the midst of Israel." So the fourth and
final commandment that was given or regulation or qualification
that was given to the kings of Israel was this. Once he is sworn
in, knowing it to be king, he is then to take a quill and ink
and the Word of God is to be laid before him and with his
own hand he is to write with his own hand The first five books
of the Bible, the books of Moses, are to be written. The Law of
God is to be written in His own handwriting and then according
to Scripture He is to read in it every day. He's to read it
every day. He's to read it every day. And the reason that he was to
read it every day is because according to what the Bible said,
it is to be with him all the days of his life. He's to learn
to fear the Lord by reading it every day. And by reading it
every day, he will know all the commandments of God and all that
he should do. All right? So the reason he's
to read it every day is so he can know how to obey God, fear
God, and submit himself to God. Do you want to know the reason
why quote-unquote Christians don't read the Bible? Because
they have no desire to obey God, they have no desire to submit
themselves to God, and they do not want to be regulated by the
Word of God. Why? They have no fear of God. No fear of God. So may I give
you a terrible, terrible report. Not one king of Israel recorded
was qualified according to chapter number 17. Saul was not qualified, David
was not qualified, Solomon was not qualified, nor was Rehoboam
qualified. They multiplied gold and silver
to themselves, they multiplied horses to themselves, they multiplied
wives to themselves, and there is no indication that any of
them ever copied out the Word of God. No indication of that. So when we read our text tonight,
David is sitting back on his throne, he's laid in his kingdom,
and he comes up with this idea, you know, I wanna number all
these people, I wanna number them. And he calls Joab in and
some of the captains, he said, I got a job for y'all, I need
y'all to run through the 12 tribes, I need you to get a number of
all the fighting men out there, I wanna know. And Joab said,
what? They're God's people. I mean,
let God know the number. All we know is that when we say
come to war, they come. Why do we have to know the number?
I wanna know. All right, whatever. And so Joab
and the men, they head out and they start counting heads and
noses and the next thing you know, it's about a million three
that they've got that have tallied up and I'm not even sure they
got all of them. and they come back and they reported it to
David, and when they reported it to David, David's heart smote
him, the Lord was displeased, the seer came, and as Nathan
came to him, he brought him word, God's displeased and God's going
to send a pestilence upon you, He's going to send a plague,
you're either going to run before your enemies, experience famine,
or God's gonna send a death angel and he's gonna plague the nation
of Israel for three days, what do you want? And David said,
just let me fall in the hands of God, I know he's merciful,
that's all I know, he's merciful, let me fall in the hands of God.
Now here's the question, the million dollar question, was
David wrong in numbering the people? Well let's go to the
Bible and let the Bible answer that question, go to Exodus chapter
number 30. In Exodus chapter number 30, the question is going
to be answered in great clarity. Look at Exodus chapter number
30. In Exodus chapter number 30, in the law of God, here's
what the Lord said, beginning in verse 11. And the Lord spake
unto Moses, saying, When thou takest the sum of the children
of Israel after their number." It didn't say once a year. It
didn't say once a decade. It said whenever you decide to
do this. Whenever you decide to take the
sum or the census of the children of Israel after their number,
then here's what you must understand. They, shall then shall they give
every man a ransom for his soul unto the Lord when thou numberest
the people. That there may be no plague among
them when thou numberest the people. He goes on to say in verse number
13, that when they pass through being numbered, they are to give
a half a shekel. After the shekel of sanctuary,
it's 20 giras, it's an half shekel, and it's an offering unto the
Lord. And everyone that passeth among them that are numbered
has got to pay this half shekel if they're going to be counted.
Now why did God say they need to be counted? Because this is
for the Lord, this shaft shackles for the Lord. What did He say
would happen if you didn't collect? God said if you don't collect,
there's going to be a plague that hits your land. David was
not wrong in counting the people. David was wrong in not collecting
God's money. Why did David not collect God's
money and why did 70,000 men die in a plague? Because David didn't know what
was in the book. David didn't know what was there.
He didn't write it down. He didn't copy it. He loved the
Lord. He was a man after God's own
heart. He just didn't know what was in God's word. Let me ask you a question. If you love the Lord, you love
church, and you love Christian people, and you love being saved,
which you wonder why God keeps putting you in a vice and squeezing
down on you. It could be you don't have a
good relationship with the Word of God to know what's in there
as to where you are violating what God said not to do. That's
why that book is as important as your breakfast. that book is important in your
life. Because as a result of that book,
you prosper. Or as a result of the lack of
that book, you are plagued. Do you even know what's in that
book? It's not a secret. It's been given to every one
of us. And God wants us to have it. And God wants us to utilize
it. And he's willing to bless us
if we honor it. And He's not willing to bless
me any greater than He's willing to bless you, no matter how old
or young you might be. If you're willing to take a lot
of stock and put it in His Word and love His Word and love His
people and love the things of God that are found in the Word
of God, God will do extremely great things for you. Terry Roosevelt's
one of my favorite presidents, and he made this statement. He
said, a thorough knowledge of the Bible is worth more than
a college education. And I'll say amen to that. Even Isaac Newton said this,
and I copied it down. He said, I have a fundamental
belief in the Bible as the Word of God written by those who were
inspired, and I study it daily. Noah Webster, that great statesman
of yesteryear, said, all the miseries and all the evils which
men suffer in life because of vice, crime, ambition, injustice,
oppression, slavery, and war proceed from their despising
or neglecting the precepts contained in the Word of God. And that's the truth.
The Importance of Your Bible
| Sermon ID | 5923048107398 |
| Duration | 28:10 |
| Date | |
| Category | Special Meeting |
| Bible Text | 1 Chronicles 21 |
| Language | English |
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