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The Lord will preserve him and
keep him alive, and he shall be blessed upon the earth, and
thou wilt not deliver him unto the will of his enemies. The
Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing, and thou
wilt make all his bed in his sickness. I said, Lord, be merciful
unto me, heal my soul, for I have sinned against thee. Mine enemies
speak evil of me, When shall he die, and his name perish?
And if he come to see me, he speaketh vanity. His heart gathereth
iniquity to itself. When he goeth abroad, he telleth
it. All that hate me whisper together
against me. Against me do they devise my
hurt. An evil disease, say they, cleaveth
fast unto him. And now that he lieth, he shall
rise up no more. Yea, mine own familiar friend,
in whom I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath lifted
up his heel against me. But thou, O Lord, be merciful
unto me, and raise me up, that I may requite them. By this I
know that thou favourest me, because mine enemy doth not triumph
over me. as for me thou upholdest me in
mine integrity and set us me before thy face forever blessed
be the lord god of israel from everlasting to everlasting amen
and amen shall we pray father we and close our reading with
a benediction, with a verse of blessing. And we come before
thee tonight, and we indeed bless your holy name at the outset
of our gathering. And Lord, we ask that you would
bless us tonight, that we would know your presence, that we would
sense your help, that God, you would open up our eyes, that
we, by your spirit, might behold wondrous things from thy law. Father we pray tonight that you
would fill us with thy Holy Ghost and thrill us with the truth
of your word and may we leave this place a little different
than the people that we came in. Lord let us leave with a
sense of awe, a sense of wonder, at your word and its power to
predict and to prophesy and to foretell the future. Father, we thank you tonight
for your blessings upon us and for the privilege that is ours
to be part of this study. In Jesus' name, Amen. So far in our series we have
considered Psalm 2 which is the Psalm of the Eternal Son. Then we went to Psalm 40 which
brought us to the Incarnation with that great phrase, Lo I
Come. And then last week we looked
at Psalm 91 which was referenced in Matthew chapter 4 the Psalm
of Temptation and in that particular instance Satan cites the Psalm
and misquotes the passage. But tonight we go back in the
book of Psalms to Psalm 41 which marks the Psalm of Betrayal. Now this Psalm, at least one
verse of it, is quoted by the Lord Jesus himself with reference
to Judas Iscariot. Look in John chapter 13 for a
moment and we'll read quite a lengthy passage. John chapter 13. John chapter 13 and we will begin
reading in verse 1 of this chapter. Verse 1 says now before the feast
of the Passover When Jesus knew that his hour was come, that
he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having
loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the
end. And supper being ended, the devil,
having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot Simon's son
to betray him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all
things into his hands, and that he was come from God and went
to God, he riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments,
and took a towel, and girded himself. After this he poureth
water into a basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet,
and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded. Then
cometh he to Simon Peter. Peter saith unto him, Lord dost
thou wash my feet? Jesus answered and said unto
him, What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter. Peter said unto him, Thou shalt
never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash
thee not, thou hast no part with me. Simon Peter said unto him,
Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head. Jesus said
unto him, He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but
is clean every whit, and ye are clean, but not all. For he knew
who should betray him. Therefore said he, ye are not
all clean. So after he had washed their
feet, and he had taken his garments, and was set down again, he said
unto them, Know ye what I have done to you? Ye call me Master
and Lord, and ye say, Well, for so I am. If I then, your Lord
and Master, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one
another's feet. For I have given you an example
that ye should do as I have done to you. Verily, verily, I say
unto you, the servant is not greater than his Lord, neither
is he that is sent greater than he that sent him. If ye know
these things, happy are ye if ye do them. I speak not of you
all, I know whom I have chosen, but that the scripture may be
fulfilled. He that eateth bread with me, he hath lifted up his
heel against me. Now I tell you before it come,
that when it is come to pass ye may believe that I am he.
Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that receiveth whomsoever
I send receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that
sent me. And when Jesus had thus said,
he was troubled in spirit, and testified, and said, Verily,
verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me. Then
the disciples looked one on another, doubting of whom he speak. Now
there was leaning on Jesus' bosom one of his disciples, whom Jesus
loved. Simon Peter therefore beckoned
to him that he should ask who it should be of whom he speak.
He then, lying on Jesus' breast, said unto him, Lord, who is it? Jesus answered, He it is to whom
I shall give a sop when I have dipped it. And when he had dipped
the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. Now no man at the table knew
for what intent he spake this unto him, for some of them thought
because Judas had the bag that Jesus had said unto him, buy
those things that we have need of against the feast, or that
he should give something to the poor. he then having received
the sup went immediately out and it was night. Now for our purposes tonight
the 18th verse is the verse that arrests our attention. It's a
quotation from Psalm 41 and verse 9 that falls directly from the
lips of the Savior himself pointing us to that Psalm and therefore
we include it in the songs about Jesus, the Messianic Psalms. Now in its primary interpretation,
this psalm relates, as so many of these psalms do, to that time,
a very dark period in David's life, when he was subject to
the rebellion of his son Absalom. And Absalom is and was a traitor. But strikingly, it's not Absalom
who is presented in the psalm as the type of Judas, but another
man whom David refers to in verse 9 of the psalm as my own familiar
friend. Now you may recall we studied
Psalm 40 together that we discussed the rebellion of Absalom to a
fair extent. We thought about how he by lies
sought to undermine the rule of his father. You remember people
would come to the city gate to do business and to seek the king's
business and Absalom would say in effect, look you know the
king's not here, you know he's neglecting his duties. But I'm
here, and if I were king, things would be different. There would
be somebody that would listen and would agree with your matter
and take care of your needs. He's rather like a politician
who's promising all kinds of things before he comes into power. And so Absalom is really canvassing
for votes, he's really desirous to win the loyalty of the people,
but of course he's really exalted on his own self, he's given to
pride, he's consumed with his own conceit. Now let's go back
to that account and let's read it in 2 Samuel chapter 15 and
we'll read the first six verses, we'll not read all of it, but
we'll read the first six verses, we'll certainly come back to
this episode as we go through the life of David on Sunday mornings. But in 2 Samuel chapter 15 It says in verse 1, it came to
pass after this that Absalom prepared him chariots and horses
and fifty men to run before him. So he's acting with tremendous
regality, you know, acting like he is the king. And Absalom rose
up early and stood beside the way of the gate and it was so
that when any man had a controversy. They came to the king for judgment
and then Absalom called on to him and said, Of what city art
thou? And he said, Thy servant is of one of the tribes of Israel,
whatever city he was from. And Absalom said unto him, See,
thy matters are good and right, but there is no man deputed of
the king to hear thee. Absalom said, Moreover, O that
I were made judge in the land, that every man which hath any
suit or cause might come unto me, and I would do him justice.
And it was so that when any man came nigh to him to do him obeisance,
he put forth his hand and took him and kissed him. In this manner
did Absalom to all Israel that came to the king for judgment.
So Absalom stole the hearts of the men of Israel. What an interesting record this
is. And you know, something I learned
a long, long time ago about people who deceive. And this is especially
true in matters of religion, but I think it's equally true
in a general sense. And it's this, every falsehood
has to ride on the back of truth. Every falsehood has to ride on
the back of truth. In other words, you have to have
enough truth in a lie to make the lie float, right? Otherwise,
if it's a painfully obvious lie, if I came in to you and said,
I'm sorry I'm late, I've just been to the moon, you'd say, Ridiculous. It's a patently obvious lie.
You haven't been to the moon, okay? But if I make some plausible
excuse, you know, I'm sorry I'm late, I had a puncture or something
like that, or I had car problems or something, you know, and I
throw in a measure of truth and then I throw in a lie, you know,
Add to that, I had a puncture, but I also had to stop on the
way to help somebody who got knocked down. The second part
might be a lie, or it might be a truth. The first part might
be a lie, it might be a truth. But you see, there's enough plausibility
in it to make it a possibility. And so that's the way lies work.
You have to have a certain degree of credibility in the lie to
make it really swim. And Absalom came and he pointed
out to people as they arrived there to meet the king that,
yeah, your matters are good, your matters are right. And of
course he's just agreeing with them, saying what they want him
to say and what they want to hear. And he says this, but there's
no man deputed of the king to hear thee. Now, that had to be
the case. You know, because obviously if
there was somebody at the gate representing David, they would
have spoke up and said, what are you talking about? I'm here
representing the King. So there had to be a measure of truth
in the fact that there was nobody there to hear the cause of the
people as they came to the gate with their complaints. So the
question arises, why was there no one there? Had David indeed
neglected his duties as King of Israel, had he become so high
and mighty, you know, rather like Marie Antoinette, he couldn't
care less about the ordinary person, and his rather cavalier
attitude, well, you know, let them do whatever they want, it's
no business of mine, I don't care, let them get on with their
problems, whatever they may be. And then Absalom, having followed
this path, then incites his rebellion, he makes his play upon the kingdom. And you've got to bear in mind,
David is a warrior king. And if there's one thing King
David is known for, it's his personal courage as a fighter. This is the man who fights Goliath.
This is the man who, as we've learned so many mornings, goes
and saves the town of Caila. This is a man who's not a withering,
shrinking weed of a man. He's a tough guy. And so the
question I raise is, well, why does he then go into exile? Why does he run away when Absalom's
rebellion takes place? Why is there nobody at the gate
meeting those who are coming with complaints? And why does
David flee the city as soon as he knows the rebellion has begun? Well, the answer to those questions
is given to us, or at least implied, in Psalm 41. If you want to go
back to Psalm 41, notice in verse 3, it speaks about the Lord strengthening
upon those who are upon the bed of languishing. He says, thou
wilt make all his bed in his sickness. Look at verse 5, my
enemy speak evil of me. When shall he die? His name perish. In verse 8, an evil disease say
they cleaveth fast unto him. The implication is, and though
that is not in the narrative of 2 Samuel, but the implication
from the psalmist is that David was very poorly when Absalom
struck, that he was very, very ill. indeed almost to the brink
of death if the words of his enemies carry any stock and therefore
we believe that the courtiers were attending to him and his
illness, that indeed the ministry at the gate where he would have
received complaints was not being conducted and that when Absalom
struck he was in no fit state to launch a defense militarily. And so he was simply ushered
out of the city and away from the situation because he couldn't
defend himself. And it would make sense, you
know, if you're going to strike someone, if you're going to attack
somebody, you know, the best time to do it is when they're
at their weakest. Isn't that right? Whenever, if you're going to make a military
strike, you don't wait for your enemy to be all armed up and
ready to fight you. You wait for him to be at his
lowest ebb and then you strike in the hope that you can secure
a quick victory, which it seems is exactly what Absalom did. So this psalm was written as
David lay upon his sickbed after that Absalom had begun his rebellion
and his efforts to become king of Israel. Now let's go back
to the psalm and we're going to look at three things tonight.
We're going to look first of all at God's favor upon the weak. verses 1 through 3 of this psalm
says, Blessed is he that considereth the poor. The Lord will deliver
him in time of trouble. The Lord will preserve him and
keep him alive. He shall be blessed upon the
earth and thou wilt not deliver him unto the will of his enemies.
The Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing.
Thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness. We come to verse 1 and I want
you to notice the word poor or the poor, the phrase the poor.
If you have a marginal reading in your Bible you might see that
there's a little notation there that gives you an alternate reading
where it says the poor or the weak or the sick. Something like that might be
in the margin of your Bible. And so verse 1, when it's speaking
about the poor, it's not speaking merely of material poverty, though
it can include material poverty, but it is in the words of Spurgeon
that the poor intended are such as are poor in substance, weak
in bodily strength, despised in repute, and desponding in
spirit. So David's circumstances certainly
equates with three of the four possible definitions of that
word poor. It wouldn't be right to say that
he was poor in substance, he was king, he was very wealthy.
But it certainly was right to say he was weak in bodily strength,
he was despised in repute, and he was despondent in spirit. And so David invokes a blessing. He says, happy is that man that
considers the poor. And happy, blessed is the man
that thinks upon me and my condition, who is kindly toward me in this
hour. And he basically says that God
will bless that person. Why? Because he's the anointed
of the Lord. He's the one whom God has appointed
as king. And those who give loyalty to
him are really consenting to the will of God for the land. And so, in that respect, he invokes
this blessing upon people and he says, you know, if you're
showing kindness toward me at this time, the Lord will deliver
you in a time of trouble. In other words, you reap what
you sow. Or, if you like, we go back to
the Beatitudes, Matthew 5, verse 7, Jesus said, Blessed are the
merciful, for they shall obtain what? mercy. And that's basically
what David is saying. He's saying those in the kingdom
who are showing mercy toward me, you also shall be the recipients
of mercy in the time of your trouble. And he says the Lord
will preserve him and keep him alive and he shall be blessed
upon the earth and I will not deliver him unto the will of
his enemies. Now in verse 3 He says the Lord
will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing. That's the sick bed. You know, languishing means to
be so weak as you're incapacitated. You're bedridden. You can't go
about your normal business. That's where my wife is tonight.
She's been in her bed of languishing all day, unfortunately. She took
sick last night and is up. throwing up and all that business
and so she's up she's been all right thank you she's fine she's
got a wonderful nurse who's been very good to her well
relatively good to her and she's doing fine but we've all been
there haven't we a bed of languishing And that's where David was. And
he likens the nursing care that he's receiving there with the
nursing care of the Lord. You know, David knows that as surely as any royal nurse
will come along to prop up his pillows in his time of illness,
so the Lord also will prop him up. He's going to maintain his
kingdom. Absalom is not going to succeed
in his efforts to overthrow the king. He's the anointed of the
Lord. God's will always prevails. God's will always comes out on
top. No matter what men do, no matter
what they do, God will always be the victor. He's always going
to be the triumphant one. And so His Word and His Spirit
nurse the soul much as any human nurse may indeed minister to
the body. Then we read in verse 4 of God's
forgiveness for our wickedness. He said, I said, Lord, be merciful
unto me. Heal my soul, for I have sinned
against thee. Now think about this. In the
fourth verse, David alludes to a sin. for which he is seeking
forgiveness, he's seeking the mercy of God, but it's evidently
a sin so serious that it has incurred the judgment of God
upon his life. It's a sin so serious that really
it has wound up in him being in his present state of circumstances. Now, there are those who teach
today that every sickness of ours is related to personal sin. There's people who teach a gospel
of so-called health and wealth. God wants you rich and God wants
you to be healthy all the time. You know what I've noticed about
health and wealth preachers? A hundred percent of them die.
Have you noticed that? And funnily enough, they all
die of illness. They're on the platform, they're
telling people God will heal them, and nobody observes that
the guy in the front is wearing glasses. Well what about his eyesight?
Or there's even one guy who wears a wig. God will heal you, he's
wearing a wig, well why doesn't God heal your baldness? It's
clear that this is nonsense. Not every time that we're sick
is it because of personal sin. We can look through scripture.
There were good men, godly men, who were sick at times, whom
God chose not to heal. who had to apply conventional
medical means to help them. We think of the Apostle Paul,
he spoke about his thorn in the flesh. I believe that was his
eyesight, that he had short-sightedness and a very serious problem with
his eyes. You read in Galatians at the end of the letter he says,
The proof that he's actually written this letter is how large
his handwriting is. You see how large a letter I've
written you. He doesn't mean the length of Galatians, which
is one of the shorter epistles. He's talking about the size of
the characters of the writing, pointing out that this was indicative
that this was the hand of Paul. He wrote in a very large script
So that he could see what he was writing. And so Paul had
this. Nobody is going to come along
and say, you know Paul had that because he was the worst of sinners.
He was the most wicked. If he had only had more faith.
Please, the Apostle Paul needed more faith in order to be healed. I mean this is a man who was
bitten by a snake and didn't die. This is a man who saw miraculous
things happening even in his ministry and through his ministry.
God chose not to heal him. Timothy, whom Paul writes to,
he invites him to take a little wine for his stomach's sake.
He invites him and suggests that he should take some wine for
medicinal purposes, that Timothy is suffering with a stomach ailment.
No, Timothy's a godly man. And there's Epaphroditus, who
I believe is the pastor of Philippi, and he comes to Paul with a gift
from that church, and Paul is commanding him, and he speaks
about him as being sick even unto death. He's at that store. But there's
not the slightest whiff of sin in Epaphroditus' life. He is
fulfilling the will of God for his life and for his church.
So we must never assume that on every occasion of illness
there is some correlated sin in our lives. I joked with my
wife today and said she chose a bad day to be sick because
I was going to talk about the sin and sickness and that would
make her look very bad. But anyway, but I don't make
her look very bad. So, we mustn't make that assumption.
But that said, sometimes sickness is related to sin. Sometimes. For example, 1 Corinthians chapter
11, we read it every time we come to the Lord's table. You
know, Paul talks about how those who abuse the table, some of
them are dead, some of them sleep, you know, and some of them are
sick, some of them are poorly, you know, God is judging them.
James chapter 5, that passage which speaks about calling the
elders of the church and having them anoint your head with oil.
And it's speaking about someone who is sick. And if you look
at the Greek word there, it's talking about someone who's actually
bedridden, who's laid low, and who's very, very ill. But what's
more important in that passage is that the sick one has committed
some sin, that the sickness is related to sin, because he's
told, if he's committed a sin, that he should confess it to
the elders. and that the prayer of faith will raise up the sick.
So in that context there's no question that sickness is connected
with sin. But we mustn't make that a blanket
rule. It's not a blanket rule. But
certainly in David's life it does seem to hold true. You know,
here he talks about a sin and he asks God to heal him. Heal
my soul for I've sinned against thee. So what sin in David's
life could possibly have led to such suffering that it would
require him to cry out for the mercy of God? Well, by far the
greatest sin that David ever committed was when he engaged
in an adulterous relationship with Bathsheba and murdered her
husband, Uriah the Hittite, in order to cover the fact that
he had been unfaithful and Bathsheba had been unfaithful while her
husband was fighting on David's behalf. at the battlefront. It's
quite an episode. We'll not take time to read it
tonight. But it's really a shocking account because Uriah, who's
a Hittite, is a man, you know, that is more noble even when
he's drunk than David is when he's sober. And that's really
a great shame on King David. But what happens at the end of
that episode is interesting. Turn with me to 2 Samuel chapter
12. 2 Samuel chapter 12. David's sin is confronted by,
or with, or by Nathan. Nathan comes along and he challenges
David. He tells him a parable. In verse
1 onward he comes, he starts telling him about a poor man
who had nothing except one little hue lamb. And he really plays
on it, you know. He basically says, you know,
it's his pet lamb. He has this lovely, fluffy, you
know, lovely, adorable little lamb. That's all he has in the
whole world. And this rich man, you know, has some people who
are coming and he needs to get some food. He needs to have some
provision for his rich guests. And so he takes the poor man's
lamb and he kills it and dresses it and feeds it to his rich friends. And David in verse 5 is enraged. His anger was greatly kindled
against the man and he said to Nathan, As the Lord liveth, the
man that hath done this thing shall surely die. and he shall
restore the lamb fourfold because he did this thing and because
he had no pity. Now notice that David pronounces
a fourfold judgment upon the fictional criminal of Nathan's
parable and his words become Not really a sentence on his
own life. He condemns his own self. Because
the whole point, and Nathan really says to him, you know, you are
the man. He says, you know, you are the rich man. You are the
one who took somebody's new lamb. You took Uriah's wife. She was
his pet. She was the one that he loved.
And he had nothing else. He lived for her. And you took
that. And you could have had any woman
in the kingdom. He did. He was a very brave man.
And so David, he acknowledges his sin and God spares him his
life, but he suffers by his own condemnation a fourfold consequence
for his actions. Four times he suffers. First
of all, his son, his baby by Bathsheba dies. There's number
one. Number two, his son Amnon rapes
his daughter Tamar. That's number two. And then number
three, Absalom, who was a full-blood brother of Tamar, murders Amnon
in revenge. There's three. And then finally
Absalom rebels against him and Absalom is killed by Joab. There's
four. So David says four times this guy is going to pay who
stole this little lamb. And Nathan says you're the man
and four times David has to pay for the sin against Uriah. So he has three sons dead and
one daughter violated. You know, there's the principle,
you reap what you sow. Here's the law of the harvest.
You don't only reap what you sow, but you always reap more
than you sow. David killed one man and violated
a woman. In return, he lost three sons
and had his own daughter violated. So he feels the pain that he
caused Uriah's loved ones as he buries children one after
another. He knows only too well of the
great tragedy to the home of Uriah the Hittite and indeed
to the family of Bathsheba. Now we come back to the psalm,
Psalm 41. God's faithfulness along the
way. So we've thought about God's
favor upon the weak, God's forgiveness in our wickedness, and now God's
faithfulness along the way. Says my enemy speak evil of me
in verse 5. When shall he die and his name
perish? If ye come to see me, he speaketh vanity. His heart
gathereth iniquity to itself, and when he goeth abroad he telleth
it. All that hate me whisper together against me, against
me do they devise my hurt. An evil disease, say they, cleaveth
fast unto him, and now that he lieth he shall rise up no more.
Now we'll stop there for a moment. David is speaking about those
right now who are relishing his problems, who are joying. in
his apparent and evident demise. You know there are those who
are observing his weakness and health, who have seen Absalom
now depose him effectively, he's out of the city, he's living
in exile away from the palace, and they are enjoying every moment
of it. You know there are people who
actually relish it when things go wrong in other people's lives.
You know we ought not to do that. We ought not even to joy over
the things that go wrong in our enemy's lives. But that's how human nature
is. And these people, you know, they
are gleefully hoping that David is going to die. Verse 5, they
ask this question, when shall he die? And his name perish. And in verse 6, it talks about
those people who see him, people coming to see David, to visit
with him. And he says they speak vanities,
you know, they come with diplomatic niceties. Do you ever notice
how politicians can say the most horrid things about each other
until one of them dies and suddenly he's a great statesman? And you
know it's duplicitous. You know that there are people
who hated each other in life and when one dies, the other
one is probably saying, you know, I'm glad he's gone. He was a
problem. And these guys would come in,
and this was the way it was in the ancient world, even up in
the medieval times. You know, kings would, when they
were ill, would be visited by other kings who would come to
see how this sick man was doing. And of course they would speak
vanities. They'd, you know, wish him well and tell him what a
great king he was and, you know, acknowledge his power and his
reign and his kingdom. But all along they're secretly
hoping he's going to die. Why? Because that's their chance,
sort of opportunity, to perhaps pinch a piece of land or take
the kingdom themselves. If you ever get the chance, do
take the time and visit Hampton Court Palace in London. And there
you'll see the state rooms of King William III. And King William
III was a sickly king, or at least that was the rumor, just
as David was a sickly king at this time. And to see King William,
you had to go through various stages. I'll not go through it
all. But you had to go through various rooms in which they started
to eliminate people until they finally got down to the last
few who could speak to the king in person. But one of the rooms
that you would enter into had a huge banqueting table, the
length of this room probably. And King William would come out,
and he would sit behind that table, which would be laden with
food. And he would eat in front of all of these people who wanted
to see him. They would stand and watch him. And he would just
sit down at that table and he would eat for a full four hours. And his purpose was to say to
all those people, see, I'm not sick. Sick man can't eat for
four hours. And he would go into the next
room. And you know, those people were coming, hoping to see a
sick king. They were coming, hoping he was
going to die. They were coming, hoping to bring a report back
to other kings and say, listen, the Protestant king of England
is on his last legs. Let's get a guy up and ready
to take over the kingdom. And it was the same thing in
David's day. They were sending these diplomatic representatives
and kings themselves coming and saying all kinds of nice things
about him. But when they left, well, they said, when shall he
die and his name perish? Long now, he's on his last legs. As David's health deteriorates,
the rumour mill has become more and more rife. Now we come to
that 9th verse. in whom I trusted, which to eat
of my bread hath lifted up his heel against me." Now this is
the thing that exercises David's mind more than anything else
during his time of illness. He has a friend, you know, he
can live with the fact that his enemies are secretly hoping he's
going to die. He can even handle the fact that
Absalom has engaged in this rebellion against him, you know, he can
live with that to some degree. But the thing that really hurts
him, the thing that really is eating away at his heart is the
fact that he is being betrayed by one whom he calls my own familiar
friend. One whom he has trusted, even
one who ate bread at his table. Who could this be? Well, look
in Psalm 55. Psalm 55 and verse 12. This psalm also was written during the time of
Absalom's rebellion. In verse 12 he says this, For
it was not an enemy that reproached me, then could I have borne it. Neither was it he that hid me,
that did magnify himself against me, then I would have hid myself
from him. But it was thou, a man mine equal. my guide, my acquaintance. We took sweet counsel together
and walked into the house of God in company. Now notice two
little clues there as to who it was. Verse 13 he describes
this person as my guide. And in verse 14 he talks about
taking sweet counsel together. There's the clues the Bible is
giving us as to the identity of this individual. Now go to
2 Samuel chapter 15. 2 Samuel chapter 15 the story
and the account of Absalom's conspiracy and ultimate rebellion
and we come to verse 12 of 2 Samuel chapter 15 and notice what it
says in verse 12 chapter 15 and Absalom sent for Ahithophel the
Gileadite David's what? Counselor from his city, even
from Gilo, while he offered sacrifices, and the conspiracy was strong,
for the people increased continually with Absalom. So he sends for
David's counsellor. Verse 31. And one told David,
saying, Ahithophel, that's David's counsellor, is among the conspirators
with Absalom. I pray thee, turn the counsel
of Ahithophel into foolishness. It came to pass that when David
was come to the top of the mount where he worshipped God, behold,
Hushai, the archite, came to meet him with his coat rent and
earth upon his head, unto whom David said, If thou passest on
with me, then thou shalt be a burden unto me. But if thou return to
the city and say unto Absalom, be thy servant, O king, as I
have been thy father's servant hitherto, so will I now also
be thy servant. Then mayst thou for me defeat
the council of Ahithophel. So, we now know who this councillor
is, this guy, this one who was David's friend. It is this man,
Ahithophel the Gaelinite. Now what was the counsel that
Ahithophel gave to Absalom? Well let's go to the next chapter.
Chapter 16 and verse 20. Then said Absalom to Ahithophel,
give counsel among you what we shall do. And Ahithophel said
unto Absalom, Go in unto thy father's concubines, which he
hath left to keep the house. And all Israel shall hear that
thou art a board of thy father. Then shall the hands of all that
are with thee be strong. So they spread Absalom a tent
upon the top of the house, and Absalom went in unto his father's
concubines in the sight of all Israel. And the counsel of Ahithophel,
which he counseled in those days, was if a man had inquired at
the oracle of God, so was all the counsel of Ahithophel, both
with David and with Absalom." In other words, Ahithophel spoke
with authority. He sounded like a man who really
had the wisdom of the Spirit of God upon him. And so he gives
this counsel. He says to Absalom, now here's
what you want to do. Here's what you should do. You
know, David's left all of his concubines at the palace there.
You should set a tent up on top of the palace where everybody
could see. And you should make it clear that you and I are going
to have relations with all of these women who previously were
in David's harem. Now why would David's friend,
his guide, the one he took sweet counsel with, why would he give
advice such as that? That's a very curious piece of
counsel. Go with me now to 2 Samuel chapter
11 and I want you to notice a little bit of detail. 2 Samuel chapter 11 And let's look
at verse 3. Now remember all of this begins
with the adulterous affair between David and Bathsheba. verse 3
David having seen Bathsheba washing upon the roof of her house seeing
her naked and lusting after her verse 3 he sent and inquired
after the woman and one said is not this Bathsheba the daughter
of Eliam the wife of Uriah the Hittite now notice who Bathsheba's
father is she's the daughter of Eliam now go with me to chapter
23 Chapter 23 and verse 34. Here we have a catalogue of all
of David's mighty men. So what does that make Bathsheba
to Ahithophel? granddaughter. She's his granddaughter. So just as David had shamed Bathsheba,
his granddaughter, so Ahithophel determined to put to shame David
by having all of his concubines put on public view so that Absalom
might openly violate them. What a sordid affair all of this
is and was. Now it's interesting, the Lord
Jesus comes along, you know a thousand years later he comes along and
he takes us his reference point Psalm 41 and verse 9 and he uses
Ahithophel in a prophetic way as a type of Judas Iscariot. Now of course the Lord had done
nothing that would bring shame to Judas in any way. But Judas
too had his reasons for betraying Jesus. You see, everybody has
a reason for everything we do. Anything you do, there's a reason
for doing it. No matter how illogical it may seem to other people,
there's always a reason. And Judas has a reason. Now you
say, what is Judas' reason for betraying Jesus? I don't want
to spend a whole lot of time on Judas, but let me say this.
Judas was an unbeliever. The Bible says he went to his
own place in the end. He went to hell. And not only that, but
John, under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, tells us in John
12, verse 6, that Judas was a thief. That he held the bag for the
disciples and that he was a thief. And in that particular passage,
he is complaining about the waste of ointment that is being spent
upon Jesus. by Mary in John chapter 12 and
John says he complained because he was a thief and the word is
kleptos in the Greek from which we get the word kleptomaniac,
one who is a habitual thief, one who steals by impulse. In other words, Judas was a deeply
dishonest man who was driven entirely by the thought of personal
gain. So why would a man like that,
an unbeliever and an impulsive thief, align himself with the
apostles of the Lord? Well remember this, Judas had
come, or Jesus had come, and he had come on the promise or
on the claim that he was bringing the kingdom. Repent for the kingdom
of God is at hand, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Alright? That was John's message, that
was the first sermon Jesus ever preached. The kingdom is coming.
And so that kingdom idea began to build a fair degree of momentum
until it finally culminates in the triumphal entry into Jerusalem
and the people are receiving Jesus as a king. They're thinking
he's now going to overthrow the Roman authorities and he's going
to establish the kingdom that they had been hoping for and
which they thought the prophets had predicted. And so in that respect, Judas,
who's a very shrewd thinker, he gets in early on the bandwagon. He thinks to himself, if this
guy's going to overthrow the Romans, if this guy's going to
establish a kingdom, I need to get in on that. Because at some
point, if he comes to government, there's going to be a lot of
money coming through our hands. And who holds the bag? Judas
does. Who's going to be the Chancellor
of the Exchequer in this kingdom, in Judas's mind? Judas is. I'm going to be the one, I'm
going to have a position of power. Actually, you know, Judas was
probably the most educated of all the disciples. Do you realize
that? Because he's from the south,
he's from Keriothos in the south, which all of the people who were
considered quite sophisticated and well educated came from the
southern part of Israel, whereas the bumpkins came from the north.
Do you remember what they said of the disciples? They were ignorant
and unlearned men. They were just farmers. They
were, as we would say in Ireland, bog hoppers. They didn't have
much of an education. So Judas, you know, he reasoned
this thing out. He thought about it and he thought
to himself, you know, if this kingdom comes, I'm in there.
I'm at the start. I've got a foothold. I'm in a
position now where I could have real power and real money and
really make a name for myself and make a success of things.
But you get to John chapter 13 and what does Jesus do? He starts
to prepare the disciples for what? His death. He starts to tell him, you know,
listen guys, I'm going to be crucified. This is what's going
to happen. And Judas is listening to this
message and he's thinking to himself, uh oh, this wasn't supposed
to happen. You know, I've backed the loser
here. And so Satan, taking the occasion of Judas' disillusionment,
enters into this disciple and provokes him to the betrayal. Now, there are parallels between
Ahithophel and Judas. You see, Ahithophel was in a
place of trust. He was the king's counsellor. Judas was in a place of trust. He was the apostle's treasurer. You know, the treasurer is always
in a place of trust. Isn't that right, Mick? We trust
our treasurer. If Mick suddenly goes on numerous
holidays to the Bahamas, and he sends us back pictures of
himself on cruise ships around the world, we start to wonder. We say, well, maybe he's filtering
off the funds here. Thankfully, he's not that kind
of man we trust. And we've put our trust in him,
to a certain degree, as any church does, any treasurer. But, Jesus,
or the disciples, they trusted Judas. David trusted Ahithophel. Then, like Ahithophel, Judas
was considered a friend. You see, David called Ahithophel
my own familiar friend. Someone that I knew really well. You remember the last thing that
Jesus called Judas? Friend. He called him friend. Isn't that interesting? Look
at Matthew chapter 26. Matthew chapter 26. Here we are
in the Garden of Gethsemane. And Judas arrives. And he is
going to pinpoint the Lord Jesus out for the Roman soldiers and
the temple guards to make their arrest. And deal with him. Verse 48 it says, Now he that
betrayeth him giveth him a sign, saying, Whomsoever I shall kiss,
that same as he hold him fast. By the way, let me stop there.
For one man to kiss another in the Near East is not an unusual
thing. It's equivalent to our handshake.
You see Arabs doing that all the time, hugging each other,
kissing each other, either cheek. That's just a cultural thing,
all right? So basically, in our society, we would say, the guy
I shake hands with is the guy you want to pick up, all right?
So he says, the one I kiss, that's the sign, that's the signal,
you want to get him. And forthwith, he came to Jesus, said, heal,
hello, master, and kissed him. And Jesus said unto him, friend. Wherefore art thy come? You know Judas was a fool really
because Jesus was the greatest friend he ever had and yet he
would betray him. And so we know Ahithophel betrayed
David and Judas betrayed Jesus. But interestingly, when Absalom's
rebellion finally had run its course and it became evident
that things were not going to go his way and that David would
retain the throne, Ahithophel hanged himself. That's how he
ended his days. He hanged himself. Look in 2
Samuel chapter 17. 2 Samuel chapter 17 verse 23 it
says, And when Ahithophel saw that his counsel was not followed, He saddled his ass in a rose
and got him home to his house, to his city, put his household
in order and hanged himself and died and was buried in the sepulcher
of his father. And of course we know that Judas
also hanged himself, didn't he? That having betrayed the innocent
blood, having realized the gravity perhaps of what he had done.
He said, I have sinned and that I have betrayed the innocent
blood. And the Pharisee said, what is that to us? He's appealing
for them to take the 30 pieces of silver back, the blood money
that he had received. And they said, what is that to
us? You've got the money. Be happy. See thou to that. And
he cast down the piece of silver from the temple and departed
and went and killed himself. When Jesus quotes Psalm 41, this
might surprise you, He did something that we saw the devil do last
week. What did the devil do? He doesn't misquote it. Jesus
doesn't misquote the verse. He omits part of the verse. He leaves
a part out. Alright? You go to John chapter
13 and verse 18. And I'll go to Psalm 41 and verse
9. And I want you to notice the
obvious omission. Psalm 41 and verse 9. Here's
what the verse says. You're all there in John 13 and
verse 8. You have a look and see what's missing. Verse 9 he
says of Psalm 41. Do you see the bit that's missing? What is it? Whom I have trusted. He left out the line whom I have
trusted. He calls him friend. He quotes the latter part of
the verse. Now of course, Satan, when he
omits scripture, he does it to twist it and to deceive. But
Jesus did it because he was quoting only that portion which applies
to himself. You see, all along, he knew who
Judas was. All along he knew what Judas
was. All along he knew what Judas
would do. Okay? And even though he permitted
him to handle the money, even though he went as far as calling
him even his friend, not for one moment from the first day
that Jesus set eyes upon him did he trust him. He didn't trust
him. Not for a second. You ever meet
somebody like that? Huh? Sometimes you misjudge people,
don't we? Sometimes you meet someone and you think, well,
I wouldn't trust him. He's squinty-eyed, or whatever it is. He's got ginger
hair, or whatever your problem is. But people have these issues. Okay. But that's not what we're
talking about. Jesus knew this guy. He wasn't
just making a judgment based upon superficial appearances. He knew his heart and the Lord
always assesses the heart. Look in John chapter two. John chapter two. Verse 23, notice this little
passage, and then we're going to go to John chapter 6. But
I want you to notice John chapter 2. It says, Now when he was in
Jerusalem at the Passover, in the feast day, many believed
in his name, notice, when they saw the miracles which he did. But Jesus did not commit himself
unto them. Why? Because he knew all. He knew all. He's omniscient. And he needed not that any should
testify of man, for he knew what was in man. Isn't that interesting? Here are these people, and they
were following Jesus. In that sense, they were disciples.
They were following him, but they were seeking a circus. They
wanted him to perform tricks. They wanted him to do miracles.
They wanted him to impress them with his power. And Jesus said,
you know what? I am not committing myself unto
those people because they are not really believers. I know
what's in them. And what's in them is not what
I respond to. Look in chapter 6, verse 64. Chapter 6, verse 64. Here Jesus says, but there are
some of you that notice, believe not. For Jesus knew from the
beginning who they were that believed not and who should betray
him. So he identifies Judas from the
off and he places him in with those who believe not. And he
said, therefore, my father. From that time many
of his disciples went back and walked no more with him." Now
the word disciples is loosely used. Disciples in the sense
that to that point they were followers of Jesus. They were
following the entourage that was going behind him everywhere
he went and observing the miracles that he did. But when he makes
this rebuke Some of them say, that's it, I'm out of here. I'm
not following this guy anymore. He's requiring too much of us.
And they turn back and they walk away. And I love what the Lord
does then. He says to the 12, will you also
go away? He says, you guys going to leave
too? And Peter gives a tremendous response. Lord, to whom shall
we go? So where would we go anyway?
He says, thou hast the words of eternal life. You see the
Lord always assesses the heart. Now Ahithophel means brother
of folly. That's what the name means. He's
the brother of folly. And certainly anybody who gives
nominal allegiance to Christ, who thinks they can just follow
Jesus in a half-hearted nominal kind of way, is someone who's
a brother to folly. The Lord doesn't trust them.
Nor does he commit himself unto them, and they will almost certainly
die in their sins. Psalm 41 closes out, David praises
the Lord, that no matter how ill he is, no matter how much
his enemies may conspire against him, or even wish him dead, ultimately
God's grace upon him will triumph. He says in verse 10, But thou,
O Lord, be merciful unto me and raise me up that I may requite
them. By this I know that thou fearest me, because mine enemy
doth not triumph over me. And as for me, thy upholdest
me in mine integrity, and settest me before thy face forever. And then the psalm closes with
that benediction. Blessed be the Lord, not blessed
in the sense of verse 1, but blessed in the sense of praise
be to the Lord God. Adored is the Lord God of Israel
from everlasting to everlasting. You know, in church we talk a
lot about commitment to Christ, don't we? We talk a lot about
trusting the Lord. But here's something that we
rarely ask ourselves. Who does the Lord trust? Who does the Lord commit himself
to? You see, in his dealings with
Judas, we discover this, that it's very possible to be someone
in very close proximity to the Savior and yet not possess salvation. And many a person there is, I
believe, who dies and goes to hell having fallen off a church
pew on the way. What do I mean by that? I mean
they came to church, they sang the hymns, they prayed the prayers,
they witnessed all that was going on, they were part of the body,
nobody suspected that they were anything other than a Christian,
but God knows the heart. And if the heart is not right,
if the heart is not honest before Him, if the heart is not trusting
of Him, and Him alone as Savior, Well then it's just a shallow
profession, isn't it? Here's the other thing that you
discover in Judas. Even in Ahithophel, you can never
judge a person's spiritual state by his associationships. Like
I just said, you would never have guessed. If you had been
hanging out with Matthew and Mark, you would have never suspected
Judas. John, of course, said he was
a thief, but John said that years after, and that was revealed
by the Holy Ghost. But at the time, nobody thought
he was a thief. If they'd have thought he was a thief, they
wouldn't have let him keep the bag, would they? Huh? At the time, he was one
of their number. At the time, he was going to
the meetings, and he was praying with the rest of them, and preaching
with the rest of them, and maybe even performing miracles. Who
knows? But this we do know. that you
can never judge a person's spiritual state by virtue of the fact that
they're rubbing shoulders with other Christians. Jesus knows his sheep, and his
sheep, and only his sheep, truly hear his voice. What comes after
betrayal in our Bibles? What happens next in Jesus' story?
It's not a hard question. What happens next? He's crucified. And that's where we're going
next in our study. Psalm 22. We'll look at the psalm of crucifixion.
Let's leave it there for this evening.
The Song of Betrayal
Series Songs About Jesus
| Sermon ID | 93013430240 |
| Duration | 1:04:10 |
| Date | |
| Category | Bible Study |
| Bible Text | John 13; Psalm 41 |
| Language | English |
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