Would you please open your Bibles with me to 1 Samuel chapter 12. Last week we read part of chapter 10 and all of chapter 11 where Samuel led the nation through a process of selecting their new king by casting lots. And God made it clear that Saul was his choice for king of the people. And shortly after that, Saul led the nation in rescuing the town of Jabesh Gilead, just across the Jordan River, from the threat of the Ammonites, who wanted to shame them and destroy them, or conquer them at least. And we saw at the conclusion after that victory, the people went to Gilgal to renew the kingdom. And we saw at the end of chapter 11 that the people were pledging their loyalty to Saul the king. God had already made him king, but they were pledging their loyalty in a new and fresh way to him. And 1 Samuel chapter 12 continues the same scene at the same place. We're still at Gilgal, and there's still sort of a renewing of the kingdom that's going on. But here, we're going to see that Samuel addresses the nation, and in many ways it's a farewell address. Samuel is not, he's going to cease serving the nation in a particular way because the cycle of the judges, the time of the judges has come to an end. Now they have a king and they no longer need him as a judge. He will continue in priestly and prophetic roles, but his time as a ruler, his time as a judge, is ended and he's going to step back and let Saul rule the nation as king. Let's read 1 Samuel chapter 12. So here at Gilgal, this is what Samuel says. And Samuel said to all Israel, behold, I have obeyed your voice and all that you have said to me and have made a king over you. And now behold, the king walks before you, and I am old and gray. And behold, my sons are with you. I have walked before you from my youth until this day. Here I am. Testify against me before the Lord and before his anointed. Whose ox have I taken? Or whose donkey have I taken? Or whom have I defrauded? Whom have I oppressed? Or from whose hand have I taken a bribe to blind my eyes with it? Testify against me and I will restore it to you. They said, you have not defrauded us or oppressed us or taken anything from any man's hand. And he said to them, the Lord is witness against you and his anointed is witness this day that you have not found anything in my hand. And they said, he is witness. And Samuel said to the people, the Lord is witness who appointed Moses and Aaron and brought your fathers up out of the land of Egypt. Now therefore stand still that I may plead with you before the Lord concerning all the righteous deeds of the Lord that he performed for you and for your fathers. When Jacob went into Egypt and the Egyptians oppressed them, then your fathers cried out to the Lord and the Lord sent Moses and Aaron who brought your fathers out of Egypt and made them dwell in this place. But they forgot the Lord, their God. And he sold them into the hand of Sisera, commander of the army of Hathor, and into the hand of the Philistines, and into the hand of the king of Moab, and they fought against them. And they cried out to the Lord and said, we have sinned because we have forsaken the Lord and have served the Baals and the Ashteroth, but now deliver us out of the hand of our enemies that we may serve you. And the Lord sent Jeroboam. and Barak, and Jephthah, and Samuel, and delivered you out of the hand of your enemies on every side, and you lived in safety. And when you saw that Nahash, the king of the Ammonites, came against you, you said to me, no, but a king shall reign over us, when the Lord your God was your king. And now behold the king whom you have chosen, for whom you have asked. Behold, the Lord has set a king over you. If you will fear the Lord, and serve him, and obey his voice, and not rebel against the commandment of the Lord, and if both you and the king who reigns over you will follow the Lord your God, it will be well. But, if you will not obey the voice of the Lord, but rebel against the commandment of the Lord, then the hand of the Lord will be against you and your king. Now therefore, stand still, and see this great thing that the Lord will do before your eyes. Is it not wheat harvest today? I will call upon the Lord that he may send thunder and rain and you shall know and see that your wickedness is great which you have done in the sight of the Lord in asking for yourselves a king. So Samuel called upon the Lord and the Lord sent thunder and rain that day and all the people greatly feared the Lord and Samuel. And all the people said to Samuel, pray for your servants to the Lord your God, that we may not die, for we have added to all our sins this evil to ask for ourselves a king. And Samuel said to the people, do not be afraid, you have done all this evil, yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart, and do not turn aside after empty things that cannot profit or deliver, for they are empty. For the Lord will not forsake his people for his great namesake, because it has pleased the Lord to make you a people for himself. Moreover, as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you, and I will instruct you in the good and the right way. Only fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart, for consider what great things he has done for you. But if you still do wickedly, you shall be swept away, both you and your king. Something I often tell my son, is that the best rest comes from a job that is truly well finished. And everyone who has any level of maturity knows that that is the truth. The best rest is when you have done your work. And the most enjoyable vacation is one that you have after you complete a big project or you tie up lots of loose ends. It's difficult to rest if there are things that need to be taken care of while you are trying to rest because they're always on the mind. Oh yes, I need to do this and oh yes, I need to do that and this is undone and this needs to be completed and so on and so forth. Well, We see here that Samuel is trying to make sure that he's completed everything so that he can rest and he can move on. And in order to do this, in order to verify and certify that he's done his job, he puts himself on trial with the people. He says, God is witness between you and me. Now, I'm on trial with you. You accuse me. If you have anything to accuse me of, stealing, defrauding, oppressing, taking bribes, perverting justice, and so on, I will make it right. Is there any unresolved conflict between us before I complete my time as judge?" And the people vindicate him in this trial. They say, you are innocent. We testify to this. But then Samuel puts the people on trial, or rather, in a way, he puts Jehovah on trial, both of them at the same time, to say, let's review a little bit of history and say, up until now in the history of our nation, who's been guilty and innocent if we consider God and we consider the people? And he goes from Egypt to Canaan and all the way up to that time rather rapidly to say, what has God done for us in all these years? He brought us up out of Egypt. He brought us into the land. Whenever an enemy has afflicted us and oppressed us, he has freed us. He has liberated us. He has done everything to bless us. But the people, what have they done? They have been wicked. They have been idolatrous. And they've really only called upon God when they needed help. Someone's oppressing us. Let's call out to Jehovah. Let's call upon Yahweh. And Samuel, as he completes his time as judge, is trying to persuade the people, stop acting this way. As we move to the future, be faithful to Jehovah. Love him and serve him. Don't just be wicked and then call upon him when you're suffering for your wickedness. Be faithful to him. But if you're not, he warns them. And so in verses 13 to 15, Samuel is reciting, in summary, he's reciting the Mosaic Covenant. This whole speech reads very much like Deuteronomy, where Moses, at the conclusion of Moses' time, has this long discourse with Israel to say, You need to be faithful. God is bringing you into the land. Keep his commandments and he will bless you there. If you disobey his commandments, God will pour out the curses of the covenant upon you. And that's what Samuel recites in verses 13 to 15. Notice the language of if then. If you will fear the Lord and serve him and obey him and not rebel, it will be well. So if you are faithful, you will be blessed. But if you will not obey, the hand of the Lord will be against you. You will be cursed. Obedience leads to blessing according to the Mosaic covenant, the covenant God made with them through Moses. Disobedience leads to curse. But what do the Proverbs say? By mere words, a servant is not disciplined. So Samuel gives them more than just a verbal warning. He says, I've warned you that God's hand will be against you. Let me give you a small demonstration of what that would look like. And so in a time of a dry season in their climate and in their geography, Samuel calls for a thunderstorm. And thunder and rain would not be normal at that time. This is God acting. Furthermore, rains on wheat harvests will destroy it, or at least badly damage the wheat harvest. I'm no farmer, of course, but commentators and a little of my own research confirms the fact that you don't want lots of rain when you're trying to harvest your wheat. It will, at the least, harm it, and at the worst, it could destroy it, especially if hail began to fall. And so Samuel is saying, look, God is not just powerful to save you, he's also powerful to discipline you, and this is what it looks like when his hand is against you. And then they witness this sudden thunderstorm that is afflicting some of their crops, and they tremble. It's a wake-up call for them. Samuel reassures them, why is it that you are still a people? You have a strategic location in the ancient Near Eastern world between world superpowers. You're a tiny little collection of 12 tribes who up until now have not even had a king. You don't have fortified cities and a central government. You're a disunited small people. You don't have a big army, etc. Why are you still here? And it's because of the Lord's goodness. How did they get here? It is because God has been faithful to himself and therefore to them. He has made them a people. And as Samuel retires from the role of judge, he reassures them that he will continue to intercede and he will continue to instruct them. So he's no longer a judge or a king or a ruler, but he will continue a priestly and prophetic role. Far be it from me, he says, to cease crying out for you before the Lord, and I will tell you the right way, I will instruct you. And then he gives a last final exhortation and warning which repeats, serve the Lord with your heart, obey him, and if you do not, you and the king will suffer. The king is no guarantee of future blessing. You have a king now, but you and the king must be faithful, or you will be cursed. What can we learn from 1 Samuel chapter 12? Would you consider five points with me, please? Five things that we can learn, and each of these points is simply a quote from the chapter. So in the first place, consider with me, empty things that cannot profit or deliver. Empty things that cannot profit or deliver. The entire Old Testament, speaks about this, and we've been seeing it various times throughout 1 Samuel up until this point, and by it I mean the folly of idolatry, the foolishness, the vanity, the hopelessness, the emptiness of idolatry. We saw that vanity, that emptiness very clearly when Dagon's statue fell down before the Ark of the Covenant in Philistia. If you remember, Dagon's statue fell, the hands broke off, the head broke off. It's just a statue. Why are you trusting in this for the Philistines? We saw this also in the case of Israel's request for a king, where we said that desire leads to delusion. When you want something really badly, you delude yourself into thinking that happiness is bound up with that thing. Well, once again, we come back to the folly of idolatry in verse 21, where Samuel says, do not turn aside after empty things that cannot profit or deliver Reinforcement, emphasis, repetition, for they are empty. It's redundant. Empty things that are empty. Vanities that are vain. Remember this, that the root of idolatry is this lie. Here's the lie that lies at the root of idolatry. It is that the lie that our blessedness lies in something or someone that is not God. The idea, which is a lie, that our blessedness is found in something or someone that is not God. I seek my blessedness. I seek my happiness. I seek my contentment. I seek my satisfaction in something or someone that is not God. That is the root of idolatry. And what does Samuel say about all those somethings and someones? He says, they cannot profit and they cannot deliver. There is no blessedness to be had in something that cannot profit, and there is no blessedness to be had in something that cannot deliver. When the enemies are at the gates, go ahead and beg your statues to fight for you, see what happens. When your crops are failing, ask your statue to rescue them, see what happens. He's saying the idols of the nations, they can't do anything, they're emptiness. Why do you trust in them? And of course it's always easy to point our finger at those, that form of idolatry, but we have our own. And as I, in the preparation for the sermon, as I began to try to make sort of lists and summaries of idols in our day, I stopped. And I'd rather put it on you to make a list. Because whatever list I make is going to be general and it will be easy to evade in many cases. But you have to ask yourself this question. In what am I trusting for profit and protection to profit and deliver, profit and protection. What do you trust in for your happiness or your blessedness? Are you turning away from God to things or to persons that are empty and powerless to profit and deliver, seeking happiness in those things? Of course we know the common ones of money. If only I had more money, then I could get the things that I want that would make me happy. More money would get me more things and more things would get me more happiness. If only I was with this person. If only I had this house. If only I had this job. If only I lived in such and such a place. If only, if only, if only, if only, it's an endless, if only I had. all of that covetousness, all of that discontentment, all that looking and longing for some things and some ones that are not God. You delude yourself into thinking that's where your happiness lies, and you have to answer the question. What are those some things or some ones in your life that you trust in to profit and protect? This will guard my happiness. This will guarantee my happiness. Remember that God is the source and the sum of all goodness and blessedness. He is the source and the sum of all goodness and blessedness. So are you seeking goodness and blessedness in some lesser thing as though it were greater? We should find our happiness in God himself, in God's holiness, and in the good things that he has given to us as being from him. We find our happiness in God himself, in his holiness, and in the good things that he has given us as being from him. Let me explain each of those things. It looks like this. You wake up in the morning and you say, I am content in my God. I am happy in my God. I rejoice in my God for who He is, simply for who He is and what He is, His perfections and His power, His goodness and His grace. I am happy in Him for His own sake because He is the source and sum of all goodness and blessedness. I am happy in Him. I have, I possess the greatest good, therefore I have the greatest happiness. He is my God. I am His child. And then the second thing is, and he has told me how to live. His commandments are his holiness relative to me. And I am happy in keeping his commandments and living in his holiness. deviating into sin is unhappiness. I'm happy in His holiness. I'm happy in Him. I'm happy in His holiness. And then I'm happy in the good things that He has given to me, understanding them to be from Him. So you woke up, you praised him, you resolved to live for him. Now you're eating your breakfast and you're thanking God. You're saying, ooh, fried eggs on toast with orange juice and bacon and a cappuccino. These are good things, but they're good because God gave them to me and I enjoy them to his glory and thanking him for them. But when you make that food an end in itself, that's how you get to gluttony. I just want more food because more food will make me happy. More food will make me... You seek your blessedness in the thing without acknowledging it as a good thing from God. Or you try to pursue happiness and goodness in something that God has forbidden. God has forbidden gluttony, but I'm going to... God must be hiding something good from me and I want to get it. Just like Satan lied to Eve when he told her that God was keeping something back from them. Don't you want to be wise like God? Don't you want God's keeping this from you? But no, when we seek happiness in what God has forbidden, that is outside of His holiness, we will not be happy. When we seek happiness in the things God has given us but without acknowledging Him in them, we will not be happy. And of course, if we do not seek our happiness in God himself, we will not be happy. There are empty things that cannot profit or deliver, for they are empty. And you have to answer the question, what are the things in your life that you have relied upon or in which you have sought your happiness and your satisfaction? And then ask yourself, and have they delivered? Have they profited? They have not. They are empty. Secondly, Consider what great things he has done for you. Consider what great things he has done for you. What is the most powerful motivator for obedience and loyalty? Here Samuel commands obedience, serve the Lord your God with all your heart and be loyal to him, love him. What is the most powerful motivator? There are various. There are various motives or motivators. Is it fear? That is a motive. Fear of punishment, fear of covenant curse. But look at the way that Samuel motivates them in verse 24. He uses the word fear, but he doesn't mean terror. He means reverence and obedience. He says this, only fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart. Now here's the motive. For consider what great things he has done for you. Fear and warnings are an appropriate motive or motivator in certain cases, but they cannot be the most lasting or fundamental motivation for any kind of relationship, but in particular, a relationship with God. The most fundamental motive that Christians should have for being loyal to God and obeying Him and serving Him should be love and gratitude. love and gratitude to consider and remember the great things that he has done for you. That is not a negative motivation, it's a positive motivation. And the motivation of fear is used at certain times when necessary relative to sin. But a motivation of love and gratitude is at all times because God's goodness and the great things that he has done for us is always true at all times. It's a lasting, it's a true, it's a growing, it's a motivation that can grow and develop and flourish. It was not so long ago that Samuel was leading the people to set up that stone of remembrance, the Ebenezer, the stone of help. Remember, thus far, the Lord has helped us. And once again, Samuel says to them, remember and consider the good things that God has done for you, the great things that God has done for you. The trouble is that we have leaky memories, don't we? and we're so distracted by those empty things that cannot profit or deliver. And when you're distracted by the empty things that cannot profit or deliver, you're forgetting the great things that God has done for you, the one who can profit and deliver. Samuel here reminds them of the Exodus. When God led them out of Egypt through Moses and Aaron, he reminds them of the time of the judges. Jeroboam, that's Gideon, and Barak, and Jephthah, and Samuel, or some manuscripts say Samson. It doesn't matter, the point is all of the judges that God raised up to deliver you. Look at the great things. He got us out of Egypt. He brought us into the land. He gave us the land. He has protected us in the land. From then till now, God has been good to us and has done great things for us. Indeed, it wasn't long ago. Why did they set up the Stone of Remembrance? It was because God had thundered against the Philistines and destroyed them. And so we ourselves need to do the same thing. Your greatest motive, your greatest push and movement to be loyal to God and to serve Him is gratitude and love in light of the great things that He has done for you. And I don't mean by the great things that He has done for you, I don't just mean your own personal history of the good things of the Lord, although all of that counts. I'm speaking more particularly of the great things that God has done for all of us who are Christians. Namely, that while we were yet sinners, dead in our sins and trespasses, hostile and hating God, what did He do? He took on our flesh. He came in a humiliating form. Compared to His glory, He came in a shape and form with no glory. He took on our flesh and he lived a life of obedience and innocence, a life of suffering unjustly, the reproaches and the unbelief and the blasphemy and the insults and the disobedience of his own people and the rest of the world. And he suffered the ignominy, the shame of being crucified in nudity and gore before the world. Why did he do this? Because he was accomplishing our salvation. Because he wanted you to be his people. Because he wanted you to be his own. Because he wanted you. He did what we could not do. He did what we did not deserve. And it was not that God sent someone else to do it. God himself took on our flesh. God himself died and suffered in our place. God himself paid the penalty that we should have paid. God himself suffered what we should have suffered. And he did it in our flesh according to his human nature for our salvation. It's the refreshed memory of the gospel, the refreshed memory of the good news, the great things that God has done for us that should motivate our obedience. Yes, there are times when fear is an appropriate motivator for the Christian to confront sin, but the lasting and true and fundamental motivation of the Christian must be love and gratitude to God. And what is it that moves the heart to love? And what is it that moves the heart to gratitude? It's perceiving goodness in another. Think of the common trope of romance stories or movies and such things, that the hero sweeps his love off her feet and she is in love with him because he has rescued her. It is his great deeds of heroism and bravery and courage and valor and more that moves her heart to admire him and to love him and to be grateful to him, her rescuer and redeemer. Well, if men and women can understand that basic sense of the heart being conquered, the heart being swept, the heart being moved to fall in love because the heart is moved by greatness and goodness, if we can understand that man to woman or human to human, how much more so when God himself comes in our flesh to suffer what he suffered and do what he did for us to rescue us. What hard hearts we have when our hearts are not conquered by His love and are not swept off our feet by His greatness and the great things that He has done for us. The Christian, every day and every moment, has every reason to be motivated to loyalty and obedience for all of the good and great things that God has done for us. And we see them in the life and the death and the new life of Jesus Christ, our God in the flesh. Do you love the Lord your God? for what he has done for you. Could you consider the great things that he has done? Then serve him with your heart. Let your heart be drawn to him in love. Let the Song of Solomon be descriptive of you to Jesus Christ. I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine. How freely the beloved's love each other in the Song of Solomon as they praise each other's goodness and beauty. That is how we should respond to Jesus Christ because of what he has done for us. Well, it just gets better as we rapidly run out of time. In the third place, we see that the Lord will not forsake his people. Samuel says this in verse 22. Why is it that they still exist in this strategic location? We said it earlier. in the midst of world superpowers and trade routes and all the rest. Samuel says why in verse 22. For the Lord will not forsake his people. And you see the capital letters. For Yahweh, your God, will not forsake his people. For Yahweh's great name's sake, because it has pleased Yahweh to make you a people for himself. Notice that Samuel says the permanence of this people in covenant with God and in Canaan is entirely founded upon God vindicating his own great name, God being faithful to himself, God keeping his promises. It is for His great name's sake, He has been pleased to make you a people for Himself. And brothers and sisters, in Jesus Christ, God has been pleased to make us a people for Himself. Are we not chosen in Jesus Christ to be a special people? Were we not redeemed by Jesus Christ to be a special people? Are we not indwelt by the Holy Spirit to be a chosen, precious, and special people, adopted by God, given His name, We are his children. We are his people because he has made us his people, chosen, redeemed, indwelt, adopted, preserved, all because the Lord will not forsake his people. And the writer to the Hebrews reminds us, doesn't he, that he who promised is faithful. What is his promise? I will never leave you or forsake you. And this means that for the Christian who is rebellious, the Christian who is in sin, we all sin, but I mean living in sin, backsliding, running away from the Lord, the Christian who is being disobedient needs to remember that the Lord never forsakes his people, and that should motivate them to run back to him. to cry out for His forgiveness, to repent of their sin, and to be restored to Yahweh because He will restore them. He will receive them. He does not cast away His people. He will forgive you. And we also need to know this in the midst of our afflictions, not just in our backsliding, but in our afflictions, that I am not suffering affliction because God has abandoned me. but rather God is with me in this affliction. He is with me in these hardships and he uses these things to sanctify me, to build me up, to humble me that I might be lifted up in everything. And I know that God is with me during all of my afflictions and at the end of them, I will be with God. And so whether we are in a trial or at the end of it, God is with us from beginning to end. And he will never leave us or forsake us because we are his people. And God has engaged himself to us. He has committed himself to us, he has covenanted with us in Jesus Christ, and he cannot lie, he cannot deny himself, he cannot fail to fulfill his promises and his words. We are his treasured possession, his special people, and for his great namesake, he will not leave us. Fourthly, notice with me the Lord's anointed, We won't spend much time here. It's something that I want to just point out kind of like as you're driving by. You see that over there? Yeah, we'll look at that. We'll get there some other time and look at it in more detail. So we're just going to drive by something and point it out. In verses three and five, Samuel mentions Yahweh's anointed. In verse five it says, the Lord is witness against you. and his anointed is witness this day. So let me ask you, who is the Lord's anointed? To whom is Samuel referring? And the answer is Saul. Saul is the Lord's anointed. That's the king. Whoever is the king is the Lord's anointed. Now, if you read this in Hebrew, what is Samuel saying? He's saying that Yahweh is witness against you and His Messiah, His Mashiach, His Anointed, His Messiah, Jehovah's Messiah is witness this day. If you read the Septuagint, that's the Greek translation of the Old Testament, what will it say? It will say that the Lord's Christ is witness this day. So what I want you to notice as we drive by is this fact, that the King of Israel is the Lord's anointed Messiah Christ, three languages for the same word, same concept. The King of Israel is the anointed one. The King of Israel is the Messiah. The King of Israel is the Christ, every single one of them. Every king of Israel is the Lord's anointed. Every king of Israel is the Lord's Messiah. Every king of Israel is the Lord's Christ. So you would very likely ask, why then do we speak about Israel longing for the Messiah or the Christ in the future? If they have the Messiah, if they have a Christ, an anointed one, why do we talk about the future? And in the simplest of terms, they began to long for a future Messiah when they saw the failures of the present Messiahs. as they see Saul's failures, and as they see the failures of the successive kings in history moving forward, that combined with God's promises and prophecies begins to shift Israel's hopes and expectations away from their present king or kings, to a future perfect king, which is that idea of THE Messiah, THE Christ, THE Anointed One. And we know, of course, who that is. That is Jesus Christ. Jesus is the one for whom they longed in light of the failings of the kings, but I simply want to drive by and have you note for now that this is where, in the kingship of Israel, this is where the concept, the idea, and the terminology of the Messiah and the Christ and the Anointed One as being the King of Israel begins. This is where it starts. And it flourishes and blossoms and develops all throughout the rest of the Old Testament until it terminates in Jesus Christ. Fifthly, and finally, the last point is entitled, The Better Samuel. The Better Samuel. We just said that the failures of the kings made Israel long for a better king and so on. We can also make a contrast, not just between Saul and Christ, but between Samuel and Christ, not by way of criticism of Samuel, and yet comparison, where in verses 23 to 25, he says this, moreover as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you, and I will instruct you in the good and the right way. Only fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart, for consider what great things he has done for you. But if you still do wickedly, you shall be swept away, both you and your king." Notice with me that Samuel continues in his prophetic and priestly role, intercession and instruction, but also notice he can only do so much. What is it that Samuel cannot do? He cannot guarantee anything. Look at all the ifs coming from him. He's saying, I will pray, I will instruct, but at the end of the day, it's on you, you and the people, or the people and the king. You must be faithful in order for you to enjoy the blessings of the covenant that God has made with us. And if you're not, you will suffer the curses. So Samuel is a mediator of sorts and in between, between God and the people, but that's all he is. And so this is not a criticism of Samuel, it's an acknowledgement of the fact that there's a better Samuel. What is it that makes Jesus Christ like Samuel but so much better? We're told in the book of Hebrews that Jesus is not just a mediator, he's also a guarantor. A guarantor, he can guarantee. What is it that Jesus guarantees? Well, Samuel said, you have to be faithful to get the blessing or you lose it. Whereas Jesus comes to us and he says, I have already completed the work. I have been faithful. I have been obedient. It is finished. I have suffered all that needs to be suffered and I have done all that needs to be done. My doing and dying, my active and passive obedience is sufficient and super abundant to forgive all of your sins and to make you righteous in my righteousness. So that Jesus is not just a mediator, not just a guarantor. He is also what we call a federal head. He is one who acts on behalf of others. A head, a federal head. And his actions are attributed to others. His suffering is attributed to us. His obedience is attributed to us. So that we are clean and clear in what Jesus has done. Samuel, in my words, says, good luck guys, I'll be praying for you. But Jesus says nothing like that. Jesus says, I have done it. And if you are weary and heavy laden, come to me and I will give you rest. because you rest in me and you rest in my works and you rest in my suffering. Samuel says nothing of the kind because he knows that's not him, that's not who he is or what he has done. Samuel was faithful. He was a good and godly man by God's grace. But there's a better Samuel, and that's Jesus Christ. And the new covenant is better than the old. It has better promises. The promise of the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. Not the promise of if you are faithful, you get to live in Canaan. But because Jesus has been faithful, we inherit the new heavens and new earth. Brothers and sisters, we ought to rejoice in that. And we ought to rejoice in the fact that he is the Messiah, the anointed of the Lord, and rejoice in the fact that God will never abandon his people because of what Jesus Christ has done for us. We ought to rejoice in the Lord's goodness to us, consider what great things he has done in Jesus Christ, and therefore not turn aside to empty things that cannot profit or deliver because they are empty. Let us thank God for the better Samuel, and the better covenant, and the better mediator, and the better guarantor, our federal head, Jesus Christ. For his great name's sake, through whom he has made us a treasured people, pure and precious in his eyes, he will never abandon us. Let's rejoice and let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, how we thank you for the great things that you have done for us in sending your son to take on our flesh and live and die and live again for us. Please help us to be motivated to loyalty and obedience. because of all of this greatness and goodness, all of this grace that you have lavished upon us in Christ Jesus. Forgive us for being fickle, forgive us for turning aside to empty things, forgive us for forgetting the great things that you have done, forgive us for looking away and walking away Please help us, strengthen us, give us joy and contentment in You and in all that You have given to us, and in Your holiness that You have commanded for us. We ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.