Well, please turn in your Bibles to 2 Samuel chapter 20. We've been making our way verse by verse through these two books, dealing with the kingdom and all of its broad manifestations, and really, Reformation, the advancement of God's kingdom, as Busser said, is simply the Christianization of all of life. Christianization of all of life, every part of life, submitting to the blueprints of God's scriptures. 2 Samuel chapter 20, and let's begin reading at verse 16. Well, let's back up and go to verse 14. He went through all the tribes of Israel to Abel and Beth Maacah and all the Baraites. So they were gathered together and also went after Sheba. Then they came and besieged him in Abel of Beth Maacah and they cast up a siege mound against the city and it stood by the rampart and all the people who were with Joab battered the wall to throw it down. Then a wise woman cried out from the city, here, here, please say to Joab, come nearby that I may speak with you. When he had come near to her, the woman said, are you Joab? He answered, I am. Then she said to him, hear the words of your maid servant. And he answered, I am listening. She spoke saying, they used to talk in former times saying, they shall surely seek guidance at Abel. And so they would end disputes. I'm among the peaceable and faithful in Israel. You seek to destroy a city and a mother in Israel. Why would you swallow up the inheritance of the Lord? And Joab answered and said, far be it, far be it from me that I should swallow up or destroy. That is not so. But a man from the mountains of Ephraim, Sheba, the son of Bichri by name, has raised his hand against the king, against David. Deliver him only and I will depart from the city. So the woman said to Joab, watch, his head will be thrown to you over the wall. Then the woman in her wisdom went to all the people and they cut off the head of Sheba the son of Bichri and threw it out to Joab. Then he blew a trumpet and they withdrew from the city, every man to his tent. So Joab returned to the king at Jerusalem. Amen. Father, we thank you for this, your word, and as we dig into it, we pray that your Holy Spirit would be our illumination, guiding us, instructing us, and that our hearts would gladly submit ourselves to your word. We love you, and we commit this continued time of worship to you. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, in this passage, we have another model peacemaker. And I love this woman and the confidence with which she does her peacemaking. I think she's a great corrective to some of the teachings that I've heard and some what I consider hyper-patriarchal movements that would object to her involvement in issues outside of the home. And I think it models to us how women can be very involved in peacemaking even as it sometimes intersects with men. And the reason I say she is a model is that twice this passage calls her wise in her peacemaking. She was wise. Wisdom is to be imitated. She shows initiative and courage and tact and diplomacy and decisiveness, and it's pretty obvious she does not share the kind of tunnel vision that we men sometimes have, where we miss, we're so goal-oriented, we miss some of the alternative solutions that are out there. You see, in Deuteronomy chapter 20, it mandated that before Israel went to war with any city, They had to negotiate with that city. They had to talk with that city. And Joab had not done it. He was so focused in on the goal of squashing the rebellion that he just immediately went to war when Sheba went into that city. And she very tactfully reminds him of this fact. For Joab, this city was an obstacle to his goal, and squashing it like a bug seemed like the most logical thing to do. And the men in the city seem to have had tunnel vision as well, because they see Joab as a threat to their lives, and they kind of hunker down, and they're taking a win-lose option as well, obviously hoping that they'll be on the winning side. of the fence. But this amazing woman rejects the idea that there are only two options, win or lose. She was looking outside the box for another solution. She knew that options would be closed off once the battle was over, and so she wants to engage in negotiations while there is still some room for negotiation. And I love this woman's example. And so I am presenting her to you this morning as a peacemaker who tries to think outside the box. So let's just go through the passage here verse by verse and phrase by phrase. Verse 16 begins, then a wise woman cried out from the city. She obviously thinks it's nuts to wait for the inevitable, and she takes the initiative. Nobody else is acting to avert disaster, so she decides that something needs to be done. Now, I'll be the first to admit. that there are people who take the initiative who actually make matters worse. And so this point by itself does not guarantee that there will be good peacemaking. So you really probably put the word wise before initiative. She was engaged in wise initiative. And let me define that word initiative. Initiative is doing the right thing without having to be told in a proactive manner and despite the discouraging prospects that you might have. You know, every one of your kids needs to be trained to be kids with initiative. Do they have this kind of initiative? Let me repeat that definition, four things. Initiative is doing the right thing without having to be told in a proactive manner and despite discouraging prospects. It is the opposite of being passive and waiting for something good to happen. And all the way through this passage, I'm going to be giving some side applications, maybe that aren't directly related to the peacemaking, and that's what we're gonna do right now. I'm gonna embarrass my wife by using her as an illustration of a woman with initiative. My wife knows my desires, my passions, my vision for the future, and the oversight that I've given to the budget. She knows my philosophy of the family, and because of that, she can make snap decisions without having to consult me, even when I'm not around in an emergency. She anticipates what I want and takes initiative, even if I have not necessarily even thought about the thing she's going to be doing, because I'm not there to think about it, right? Now I'm going to give you a little illustration that might make some of you nervous. It does not make me nervous in the least. Well, this does take place in the workplace, so you might have a controversy about whether this woman should even be in the workplace. Just set that aside, because I'm just going to focus in on this woman's initiative, and you can transfer that application to the home. The article says, Helen's manager was due to meet with her and her co-workers to discuss their role in the next product rollout. Unfortunately, he's been snowed in at an airport on the other side of the country and his cell phone battery is dead. The deadline is tight, and the team can't afford to waste a day because of his absence. Helen was the last person to talk to her boss before he left, and he'd outlined who was going to be doing what on the project. So Helen takes command, and within an hour, everyone on the team has their preliminary tasks mapped out. When her boss arrives in the office three days later, he's impressed and grateful that Helen took responsibility to get the project moving. If she hadn't, several valuable days would have been lost. Now there are some people who would have issues, would have problems with a woman doing that. Not me. She was in total submission to her boss's stated desires when she took this initiative. She was anticipating what her boss would have wanted. When a woman is in total submission to her husband and has her husband's trust, she can have great initiative without in any way undermining his leadership. And it's that kind of initiative that makes a husband-wife team have such synergy. Now, you know what synergy is, right? Synergy is the increased output that you have from two or more combined efforts. For example, some people use the illustration of a thread. If a thread could hold up one pound, You might expect that three threads that are wound together would hold up three pounds, but in fact they hold up between eight and nine pounds, and if you have six of those threads wrapped together, the synergy impact increases. Let me give you another illustration, this time from the realm of horses, and I think I've used this illustration in years past. But I am always astonished when I see these videos of draft horses, incredibly powerful animals. And I watched this one video a few years back where at the county fair, the lead winning horse won. He pulled 4,500 pounds. The second finisher wasn't even close. It was 4,000 pounds. But at the end of the county fair, they decided, let's hitch these two together to see how much they will be able to pull. Well, the two horses pulled separately 8,500 pounds, but when they were yoked together, they were able to pull 12,000 pounds. Okay, that's synergy. And the ideal marriage is a marriage that has synergy where the man and the woman can get much more accomplished together than they would have if they had remained single. And why do they accomplish more? It's the economic principles of synergy, division of labor, specialization. But some men are such micromanagers and some women are so needy that they actually accomplish less in their marriage than they would if they had just remained single. And I know this is a long rabbit trail, but I think it's really important that we men understand that when we can trust our wives, to know and follow our philosophy for the household. Our wives can take initiative without in any way undermining our leadership, but we must relinquish a micromanaging philosophy that says everything has to be done exactly so and be approved by us. And we're wearing ourselves out when we do that because we're not multiplying our efforts The family can't go any further than my abilities, cannot go any higher than my abilities. And proof that this woman was not undermining the desires of the leaders of that city can be seen by the fact that the leaders were unanimous in agreeing with her in verse 22. She had anticipated the desires of the leadership, even though they themselves had not thought of this idea. Now, that's the kind of woman that you want to have side by side with you. You don't have to micromanage her. You know that her initiative is always going to be engaged in your best interests. And that was true, even though this was a very stressful situation. I love this woman. She's like my wife. Okay, she anticipates my desires, takes initiative without having to be told to do so, and yet she is in total submission to me. And in conflict resolution, people of initiative are indispensable because they can take the needed action at just the opportune time. And that brings up subpoint two, subpoint B, trying to make contact. Sometimes that takes courage and boldness. with arrows flying through the air. It was probably dangerous for any of the soldiers to be sticking their heads up over the wall. They're gonna get shot at, right? And yet somehow this woman found a person who was somewhat isolated from the rest of the army. I think she's probably on a different part of the wall than where the siege works was being laid. And somehow he's out there alone, close enough where he can hear her and yet far enough away from the central focus of the battle that it's a little bit safer, and yet there's still some risk that she's engaged in. Now when that rare opportunity availed itself for her to be able to yell out to this guy, She would not have the luxury of being able to go to the leaders and say, hey, I found a guy all by himself and you guys can talk to him. It really would be a good thing to talk with him. No, the opportunity would be completely lost. She knows that she needs to snatch the opportunity while it is there and she yells out. So there is initiative and there's also boldness in doing this. There is also some risk in her doing this. Sometimes being a peacemaker can make you a little bit nervous. I remember one time, that I had to engage in an intervention on behalf of a woman who was being abused by her husband, and I was very calm, and yet I was forceful in telling this man that what he was doing was illegal, but more importantly, it was against the moral law of God, and I was going to hold him accountable for this. Well, he got furious, tried to punch me in the head, and I told him, look, you can beat me up, but I am here as an authority in your life, and I'm not going to stand down, I'm not going to stand for this kind of abuse to this woman." That made him even more furious. And it took some time to talk this man down, but eventually he got to a place where he was calm, and we were able then to make some progress on peacemaking, especially calling him to be willing to deal with his anger. But sometimes it takes boldness, it takes courage to be a peacemaker. To use the figure here, it takes the willingness to stick your head up over the wall when the arrows are flying, okay? There's some risk in being a peacemaker. The third sub-point under trying to make contact is that there are times when you cannot do it yourself and you need someone else to be involved. Now, this woman could not get Joab's attention, so she yells at the soldier, here, here, please say to Joab, come nearby that I may speak with you. Now, in some circumstances, that would actually be meddling, okay? If the leaders were already involved in a parlay with Joab, you know, I don't know that they had white flags of, negotiation back then, but if they had a white flag of negotiation and they were already in parley and then she's off doing this own thing independently, that would not be a good thing. That would be meddling. It would be a kind of rebellion actually. But what she was doing was trying to act in a way that would not undermine leadership and yet recognizing that the leadership either did not have the opportunity to act or for some other reason did not do so. So she tries to conscript help. She yells for a person to bring Joab over. Now, we're not told why this soldier bothered to listen to her. Maybe her demeanor was such that he was intrigued, but anyway, he does, he calls Joab. The woman then tries to gain a hearing with Joab, and it's so important, I think, that we try to gain a hearing when hostilities have caused two people to stop listening to each other and not willing to be listening to anybody else. It takes effort to gain a hearing. Verse 17, when he had come near to her, the woman said, are you Joab? He answered, I am. And she said to him, hear the words of your maidservant. And he answered, I am listening. So in that verse, she has accomplished the general goal of point number one, try to gain a hearing. They may not want to listen to you, but try to gain a hearing anyway. It may take courage. It may take initiative. But I want you to notice that she gained this hearing with humility, not with arrogance. She said, hear the words of your maidservant. Okay, those words were self-effacing. They are humble words. You're much more likely to gain a hearing from a person when you approach him humbly than if you approach him arrogantly and with anger. I am your maidservant. I'm here to serve your best interests. And so that's Roman numeral one. Try to gain a hearing. But the fact that she was humble did not mean that she was servile or that she lacked confidence. And that is Roman numeral two. I think it was her very confidence that helped to gain her a hearing. And we'll look at verses 18 through 21 in more detail in a bit. But I do want you to notice three things about her speech that make Joab take her seriously. First of all, she speaks with authority. Now obviously she had zero authority over Joab. We're not talking about authority over a person, but we're talking about speaking with a confidence and authority that comes from God Himself. And there was something about her demeanor that shows that. The first thing that gave her a sense of confidence is she knows what she is talking about to some degree, and she knows that she is right. And let's just go ahead and read through verses 18 through 21 in one fell swoop, and then I will comment on it. So she spoke saying, they used to talk in former times saying, they shall surely seek guidance at Abel. And so they would end disputes. I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel. You seek to destroy a city and a mother in Israel. Why would you swallow up the inheritance of the Lord? And Joab answered and said, far be it, far be it from me that I should swallow or destroy. That is not so. But a man from the mountains of Ephraim, Sheba, the son of Bichri by name, has raised his hand against the king, against David. Deliver him only and I will depart from the city. So the woman said to Joab, watch, his head will be thrown to you over the wall. Now how could she be so confident that that would be the case? What enabled her to speak with such authority? Well, think about it. If the leaders in the city are presented with an alternative, kill Sheba, or every man is going to be destroyed in the city. Do you think they're really going to hem and haw about it? I don't think so. I don't think so. This was not an ill-founded confidence. She knew what her leaders would want, and it was a being in tune with what they would want that enabled her to speak with such authority. It was being in tune with what they would want that enabled her to speak with such authority. At our previous church there was a woman who was married to a military man who would be gone for months at a time, and she wouldn't mind my telling you this story, so don't worry Don't worry about that. But anyway, this woman asked my wife for counsel on how to deal with conflict in her marriage. Every time that this military guy would come home the first month or so, it was just nonstop conflict, it seemed like. Well, as my wife dug a bit into what was happening, it became quickly evident that when the husband was gone, she saw herself as being in charge. When he would come back, then she would have to make a transition into seeing him as in charge. When he was gone, she would do things her way. When he came back, she would have to transition into doing things his way. And it was just a constant conflict and period of adjustment. And it wasn't like either of those two ways was bad ways of doing things. It was just that there were two different ways. Anyway, Kathy told the woman that when I, her husband, am gone, I'm still in charge. And she tries to anticipate exactly what I would want. And by the way, we taught our kids to do this with their bosses. You know, when they would work outside the home, say, don't wait till your boss has to tell you what to do. Try to anticipate his needs. Try to think through and be somebody who's proactive. You're going to become indispensable when you do that. Anyway, Kathy always acted as if I was in charge, whether I was present or not. And her behavior never had to change because It was the same whether I was present or not. There might have been some things that she would ask my guidance for, but for the most part, she knew what my leadership would want, and there was no period of adjustment when I came back, and so she told the woman, really what you need to do is see yourself not as a secondary career person. You need to see yourself as a helpmate. He is the one that drives the vision of the church, and think of your life as how I can best help my husband and anticipate his needs and his philosophy. Well, she didn't have problems doing that. It just hadn't dawned on her that this was what was going on. She did it, and just that little adjustment solved all of the problems that they were having in their marriage. That woman no longer lived independently when the husband was gone and the transition after deployment was finished was as smooth as could be. Though she continued to make decisions with confidence and skill, and she was a very talented woman, Though she continued to make decisions with confidence and skill, it was not an independent confidence. Okay, so back to our passage. I believe that this woman's confidence was not an independent confidence, but a confidence in knowing exactly what the city leaders would want. It was a confidence that she was doing the right thing. And who knows, she may have been one of the wives of one of the city leaders. We don't really know who she was. The second thing that gave her confidence was that she knew that Joab had violated God's law, and what she was asking for is something that Deuteronomy 20 mandated anyway, to talk to the city before you go to war against the city. Commentators point out that this is one of two things implied by that that odd phrase there, they used to talk in former times saying, they shall surely seek guidance at Abel, and so they would end disputes. Now obviously it is talking on the one level of a historical fact that people used to go to Abel for wisdom, and some people believe for prophetic wisdom, since that phrase is used of Deborah as well, a mother in Israel, and I'm not sure about that. There's a lot of debate on that phrase. But commentators point out that this was also a polite way of asking, why did you declare war without ever talking to the leaders of this city, without ever asking for their counsel? That's what people used to do, okay? So Deuteronomy 20, mandated talking to the leaders of even a pagan city before they went to war against how much more so an Israelite city. So some commentators believe that's almost certain to have been in the background of her thinking. So knowing God's scriptures gave her authority. There have been times when I've had to confront a person about some sin, sexual immorality, or something else like that, and the person has told me, you know, the Bible says, judge not that you be not judged. And my response always is, oh, I'm not judging you, God is. I'm just here telling you what God is saying in His Word, and we're both subject to God's judgment. We're both subject to the scriptures on this issue. Even if you have no authority over another person, 1 Peter 4 verse 11 calls you to speak with the authority of an oracle of God. That means a mouthpiece of God. If you've got the scripture backing you up, you have the ability to speak with authority. That scripture gives you a sense of authority. Peacemaking is not just telling people to quit fighting and be nice. That's humanism. Biblical peacemaking is approaching the conflict from the objective status of knowing the truth and standing on the side of truth. And I think there's too much peacemaking out there that ignores the truth and just sweeps sin onto the carpet. So she had confidence that she knew she was right. Second, she had confidence because she had the authority of Deuteronomy 20 behind her. The third thing that gave her confidence was that she was seeking something that was actually in Joab's best interest and in Israel's best interest. Verse 19, I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel. You seek to destroy a city and a mother in Israel. Why would you swallow up the inheritance of the Lord? Now, three things that are implied here. First, I believe it implies that a Christian nation should not fight against a Christian nation. It's not in the Christian nation's best interest. Second, that the city of Abel was a mother to Israel was probably a reference to the protective status that Abel had been giving to Israel. Abel was about as far north as you could get, so when the barbarian hordes, you know, would come and invade Israel, they were the first step in protecting Israel. It was a defensive city. Now, it may have had implications of it being a prophetic center as well, though I'm not certain on that, but since it was a northern border, it had borne the brunt of invasions and had served Israel well. It was not in Israel's best interests to get rid of and destroy Abel, one of the key defensive cities for David. Now there's debate on the exact meaning of the term, but I don't think you can have any mistaking the implication you shouldn't be attacking your mother, right? I think that's clear. You need your mother. It's not in your best interest to attack your mother. Then the third reason she had confidence in speaking to Joab was that God had given the tribe of Dan the city of Abel, and it was not in the privileges of any other tribe to take this city away. Why are you eating? Why are you swallowing up? the inheritance that does not belong to you. This is our inheritance. God himself has given it. Now, she obviously wasn't aware of the situation that Sheba had been a rebel against David. Sheba may have told the city a totally different story. But in any case, this represents her initial shock that Israel would attack and try to take away part of the inheritance of Dan. But the point I'm making is that she was able to speak out of confidence because she felt that what she was doing was right. A peacemaker cannot go into a peacemaking situation without having confidence in the rightness of doing so. Some of the peacemakers that America sends out to other countries are in a bind. They're in a difficult situation because they're trying to have peacemaking And yet they're defending policies that are indefensible. You know, it's really tough in that situation. Hard to convince people to be at peace when you're not in the right. If Abel had started this war, if they were not in the right, they were the aggressors. You know, it would have been really hard to accomplish anything. If she had been timid, nothing may have happened. If she was only concerned about her own skin, nothing may have happened. But her confidence in God's Word and that a resolution could be achieved won the day. Okay, the third major thing that her speech accomplishes is that it's trying to build a basis for trust. Why should Joab trust her? And why should Joab trust the city of Abel at all? Well, in verses 18 through 19, it shows three additional things that formed a basis for trust. She told Joab of Abel's history of wisdom. They used to talk in former times saying they shall surely seek guidance at Abel and so they would end disputes. The city had been trusted for a long time to be a place where you could go to find counsel and specifically wise counsel for disputes. We're in a dispute, so why don't we parley, okay? Plenty of reason to trust negotiations just based on our long history of being involved wisely in conflict resolution. So that's the first thing. We have a track record that you can trust. I've known people who have wanted to be involved in counseling and conflict resolution, and yet they have had no track record of success in peacemaking. In fact, they've got the opposite. They've got a track record of breaking the peace, you know, causing conflict continually, and yet they want to be peacemakers. It doesn't make much sense. I had a pastor here in the city approach me one time and give me a flyer and he says, could you please distribute these flyers to all of the people in your congregation? I'm a professional marriage counselor and I would like to give counsel to your congregation. And I almost laughed out loud because when I glanced at this brochure, one of the top qualifications that he gave as to why he would make a great marriage counselor is that he had gotten a divorce. And so I start asking questions about this guy and I come to find out that he was kicked out of a liberal church And the reason he was kicked out is because he was having sexual shenanigans with the secretary. Not a great track record. So there's going to be no trust for marital counseling from a guy like that, right? But the city of Abel has a track record that you can trust. So first of all, Abel had a track record of wisdom. It wasn't just a youngster out there wanting to counsel. Second, it had a track record of actually settling disputes very successfully. She said, and so they would end disputes. In other words, they were successful. So she's telling Joab that there were resources in the city for a wise resolution of any conflict, including this one. Thirdly, she herself was a woman committed to being faithful to the Lord and pursuing peace. She said, I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel. And since she was among the peaceful and faithful of Israel, she implies that the others in Abel had the same faithfulness and peaceableness as well. and are not just intent on winning a war. In effect, she was encouraging Joab not to engage in the fallacy of guilt by association. It appears she didn't even know why Joab was fighting against the city, but whatever the reason might be, don't just assume that everybody in this city has that problem, has that issue. But anyway, it's a veiled rebuke to Joab, but she frames it in a way that forms a basis for trust. So even though the speech she gives has Hebrew metaphors that are kind of obscure to us, it really is a cool little speech once you understand the metaphors. But there's a fourth dynamic that I see for peacemaking in this passage, and that is that she was trying to appeal to the common interests that both sides had. She didn't just focus on who was right and who was wrong. She tried to find out what is driving Joab so that she could figure out a way of meeting both his goals as well as the city's goals. Finding common ground is one of the key principles that Ken Sandy talks about in The Peacemaker. How can we both have our central aims achieved rather than turning this into a win-lose situation? Now, I'll be the first to admit, there are times where that's impossible. It's going to be a win-lose situation or a lose-lose situation, but at least she's attempting to make it a win-win situation. She says, you seek to destroy a city and a mother in Israel. Why would you swallow up the inheritance of the Lord? Now whatever she meant by that, it must have struck a chord with Joab because he immediately responds Far be it, far be it from me that I should swallow up or destroy. It's almost like he's taken aback by what she has to say. Even Joab had no interest in destruction for destruction's sake. He must have realized he was partly in the wrong on this, but he also feels that she has misunderstood, so he's trying to defend himself. His goal was to do away with rebellion and to seek the peace of the nation. And so she was able to appeal to a common desire between both parties. And when it comes to national politics, there have been some people over the history of America who have been very, very successful in doing this. And even a pagan nation can sometimes make some headway, some progress, if they will emphasize what are common interests to both sides. And I'll give you an example. Thucydides gave an account of a fascinating debate that took place after the Middlenian Revolt that started in 427 BC. After a five-year war, the revolt was put down. And the Athenians debated amongst themselves as to what kind of a punishment should be meted out to the Mithileneans. There were a lot of different speeches there, but Thucydides only highlights the speeches of Cleon and of Diodotus. Cleon spoke for harsh punishment by putting all of the Mithilenean men to death and enslaving all of the women and the children, whether they were aristocrats or commoners, he said, we got to make a powerful example of them. He gave three reasons. He said, first of all, it's going to form a strong deterrent to others because they're going to be fearful that the same thing is going to happen to them. They don't want to be wiped out after a war. Second, Enemies will stay enemies. And if you show mercy to these guys, they're just going to rise up and revolt a second time. Thirdly, he argued that failure to punish in this way would teach other states, hey, these are softies. You can get away with revolt anytime. There's going to be constant revolts. Diodorus gave a rebuttal to Cleon using the tactic of pointing to the common interests for both sides. And he said, we just need to put the leaders of this movement to death, not all of the people. And he gave a number of arguments. His reasoning was that if everyone was put to death when there was a revolt, people would fight to the final man knowing that they would die anyway. And so there would be no motivation whatsoever for surrender in future battles. That would make battles very, very costly. Second, this would guarantee longer wars and more costly wars. Thirdly, the prize of the captured state would be worthless because it would be left in ruins. Fourth, if other nations did to them what they were planning to do to the Middlenians, their own commoners would be much less likely to want to go to war with them because they thought, well, we might die in battle. For sure, if we lose, we're going to get wiped out. They would be a little bit reticent of fighting for them. And then, fifthly, he said the commoners in the other country would be less likely to revolt against the aristocrats if they would be dead either way. Diodatus won by a very slim majority, but again, his approach to the debate Showed that he was trying to think of what would motivate both sides of the debate. What would be in the common interests? Each side and I think that's exactly what this woman is doing She is saying that he is destroying a city that acts like a mother to Israel She is saying secondly that Joab had a vested interest in the future survival of the city if it really is a mother to Israel Israel will be hurt if the mother is hurt now those kinds of Negotiations don't always work out. There's all kinds of things that can get in the way, pride and anger and other things. In fact, a few weeks ago, I mentioned the account that R.L. Dabney gave of a delegation from the South that came and begged Abraham Lincoln to consider a compromise and to not go to war. Colonel Baldwin assured Lincoln he would not have to compromise a thing on his views of the Union and he sought to convince Lincoln that they had the votes to eventually make reunion possible if they would only concede the unconstitutional point. Colonel Baldwin said, only give this assurance to the country in a proclamation of five lines and we pledge ourselves that Virginia and with her the border states will stand by you as though you were our own Washington. So sure am I of this, and of the inevitable ruin which will be precipitated by the opposite policy, that I would this day freely consent, if you would let me write those decisive lines, you might cut off my head, were my life my own, the hour after you signed them." He was offering his life in place of the country going to war and guaranteeing the union would be achieved without war if Abraham Lincoln would just strike the unconstitutional issue at stake that was so harming the South. So Colonel Baldwin was engaging in exactly this kind of negotiation, showing what was at stake for both sides, horrible, horrible losses and showing the benefits to both sides. Unfortunately, Lincoln adamantly refused any compromise saying what then would become of my tariff. So there are no guarantees that peacemaking will work, but appealing to common interests can sometimes be an effective strategy. And we see here, it definitely was effective with Joab. In verse 20, Joab says, he has no interest in destroying Abel or swallowing their inheritance as if it belonged to him. That was not his intent. Then, in verse 21, we get to the heart of the matter. We see a narrowing down of the discussions to what the real problem was. And you will never have peacemaking if you do not have this point. Too many times, peripheral issues cloud the discussions. Joab was treating Abel's closed gates as the real problem. Abel was treating Joab's hostile intentions as being the problem. And it suddenly dawns on Joab after her speech that she didn't have a clue and the city didn't have a clue of the rebellious intentions of Sheba. So he tells her what the real problem is. Now it's too bad he hadn't done this earlier. But he says, that is not so. But a man from the mountains of Ephraim, Sheba the son of Bichri by name, has raised his hand against the king, against David. Deliver him only and I will depart from the city. Now let's just assume the city has a population of 20,000 people. Okay, by fighting against the city, Joab was generalizing the problem as being 20,000 strong, but after the ensuing conversation, negotiations, they have whittled it down from 20,000 to only one problem, Sheba. Okay, and since they both had narrowed things down to agree to the same problem, they could come to resolution. In the story I told you about Colonel Baldwin and Abraham Lincoln, they couldn't narrow things down to one problem. Lincoln and the Southern delegation saw two totally separate central problems, and it was impossible to come to agreement. For the South, it was the survival of the Constitution that was at stake. For Lincoln, it was money and maintaining the union. One eyewitness quoted Lincoln as saying, if I do that, what will become of my revenue? I might as well shut up housekeeping at once. Now, in my view, Lincoln's unconstitutional perspectives was the Sheba that needed to be beheaded. That's a discussion for a totally different time. Though the North was not willing to deal with the unconstitutional philosophy of Lincoln, this woman was certain that her city would deal with the problem. Second half of verse 21. So the woman said to Joab, watch, his head will be thrown to you over the wall. Because of her willingness to deal with a real problem, she managed to negotiate a deal with Joab. And in the process, she saved countless lives. But this application really can go to a number of different ways. If the only solution you can think of to resolve a conflict between two people is to tell them, stop it, be nice with each other, you're probably not gonna be successful. Many parents don't deal with the real issues at stake and the conflicts between their children, and they try to separate them, try to get them to be nice, but there is likely a sin in one or both of those children that needs to be metaphorically beheaded, okay? And without narrowing the problem down, we're covering the problem with a band-aid. I'll give you an example of something I was just astonished by this past week. I've read humanistic books on peacemaking that completely miss this principle. They're focused only on principle number four, and as a result, as far as I'm concerned, they're useless books. One book on conflict resolution I read this past week was absolutely confident that they could resolve the differences between pro-lifers and abortion advocates by highlighting things that they have in common. Okay? We can work together if we could only figure out, you know, how to work on a common good. Well, I'm sorry, it's just not going to work. If the godly goal is not shared by both sides, then peacemaking will not work. And I think it's a huge, huge mistake people make in our culture. Christians want to be so nice that they end up harboring the enemy of God and of His Word. For example, They stay in a liberal denomination that has denied the central facets of the gospel an incredible offense to God. They deny the gospel. They deny the inerrancy of scripture. They support homosexuality. They support abortion and all kinds of other things. And yet they stay in the denomination because they're focused on things that they have in common with this denomination. And they're utterly ignoring the dangerous Sheba's who need to be metaphorically beheaded. And in the process, the denomination keeps getting more and more corrupt. It's guaranteed to become more corrupt until the Sheba's are dealt with. The Shebas guarantee it. As long as politicians in Washington, D.C. are treasonous constitution breakers, no constitutionalist should even bother looking for common ground with them. See, there are some things that you must fight in a win-lose battle. You must fight that way. There are some things so bad, if you don't fight for them, you are being faithless. In the last century, J. Gresham Machen worded it in his fight against liberalism this way. He said, in the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding. The really important things are the things about which men will fight. And there are too many people who don't want to fight. They want to leave the Shebas alone. And Joab knew that if he left Sheba alone, the whole kingdom was in jeopardy. There can be no peace treaty between pro-lifers and abortionists because abortion is a Sheba that must be stopped. That must be a battle that continues until one side or the other side loses. If the first four points are being followed without the godly goal of point number five, you actually end up sweeping the problems under the carpet and perpetuating them. So yes, we should try to make contact with those that we are at war against. That's point number one. We should speak with the confidence that comes from knowing the Bible and standing for the truth. That's point number two. It's always helpful if the other side knows that we are trustworthy. Point number three. It's useful to appeal to common interests as we present our goal of point number four. But let's make sure that we are dealing with the problems that God sees as problems and not see the conflict itself as being the only problem. This unnamed lady was a true peacemaker because she was willing to fight against Sheba once she understood that Sheba was the problem. And that's one area that Joab was absolutely in the right and she needed to be instructed on. And in verse 22, she went through the same process of convincing the leaders of Abel to deal with the same issues. Verse 22 says, then the woman in her wisdom went to all the people and they cut off the head. Notice she didn't do it. They cut off the head of Sheba, the son of Bichri and threw it out to Joab. Then he blew a trumpet and they withdrew from the city, every man to his tent. So Joab returned to the king at Jerusalem. Now that verse shows the power that wisdom and peacemaking can have to change nations. You don't need bazookas and tanks to change a culture. All you need is the truth of the Word of God to be able to change a culture, and if you're skeptical of that, You don't know history. You need to read the first 1,500 years of history. Unbelievable missions movement where you see country after country being completely Christianized. You see Armenia and England and Scotland and Ireland and Germany and Italy and Spain and other countries. They were won by the Word of God. Brueggemann makes a very insightful statement when he says about this passage, the raw political strength that dominates this story presents the wise woman as an important contrast. She stands as an alternative to the relentlessness of David and the ruthlessness of Joab. In the midst of Jerusalem's realpolitik, the wise woman can remember another way. She can still imagine that careful speech, peaceful treasuring, and secure trust offer another way in public life. There is more to public life than David's sexual politics or Joab's killing fields. You could almost say exactly the same thing about politics in America, couldn't you? So this passage gives us a glimmer of hope in the midst of horrible political situations. On the one side, Okay, an entire city is facing death. On the other side, we've seen that David's hands are tied. I mean, he feels frustrated by the political machinery. He cannot move forward in righteousness. So very discouraging times to live in. And yet here was a woman who had the faith to instantly take advantage of a providential opportunity. And as a result of doing so, she brought about a peace that just hours before seemed absolutely impossible. Peacemaking can sometimes happen from people and places far removed from the centers of power. God uses the most unlikely candidates, a little maid speaking with confidence about God's power to heal her mistress's husband, the powerful Naaman. And just think of the incredible national peace that came as a result of that little maid's testimony. Okay? The application goes way beyond peacemaking. Do we have the courage to take advantage of the providential opportunities that God brings into our paths? God could use you to turn our city upside down. And if you want a book of stories from the past 2,000 years of unknown men, women, and even children who turned their cultures upside down, Once again, I highly recommend that you read George Grant's book, Third Time Around. Incredible book. Incredible book. It's subtitled, A History of the Pro-Life Movement from the First Century to the Movement, and it looks at times and circumstances that were far more evil than our own, far more discouraging than our own, and yet there were ordinary people who made a difference. People like this lady right here who took advantage of providential opportunities that God was giving And even though they were weak, were used by God to turn cultures upside down. I'm not kidding. I'm not exaggerating. God used ordinary people to turn cultures upside down. And you can read about the impact in that book of a runaway girl, Dimpna, as just one of hundreds of examples. Dimtna was in the Flemish lowlands, and she had to flee from the lecherous, incestuous advances of her father. So she's like a person who has no father, who has no protection, and yet she saw opportunities everywhere. She was involved in establishing orphanages, caring for the poor, opposing abortion. during a fearful time when others were trying actually to withdraw and to protect their assets and to hunker down because of the barbarian invasions on the frontiers in the north, invaders on the coastline, and because of the the paralyzing, futile conflicts in the center of the country. Everybody was just like withdrawing. And she was saying, wow, what great opportunities to talk about the gospel of Christ. She was not discouraged. She saw as humanism was falling apart, the advantage of presenting the wonderful blueprints of scripture, advancing the shalom of God into this country. And she made a huge impact. Now, it may be true she wasn't even trying to be a success. I doubt that she was trying to be a success. She was just looking to be faithful to God in the face of opportunity. But it's recognizing opportunity and not running from it that is part of the battle. And we're going to be closing with a song that challenges us to have initiative and to seize the small opportunities that God presents to us like this woman did. May it be so, Lord Jesus. Amen. Father God, as we sing this song, May it be something that we would lay hold of. May we have the courage and the boldness and the initiative to make a difference, even though we feel weak. and inadequate, even though the things that we do don't seem like they could be leveraged by you to accomplish much of anything like this woman accomplished. Yet, Father, we know that with you, all things are possible. You take the weak and the despised things of this world. You take the disadvantaged of this world, and Father, you advance the power of your gospel through them. In our weakness, your power is made perfect, and so I pray that each one here would feel encouraged that they would stand in total submission to Your will and to their role in life, and that You would powerfully use them for the advancement of Your kingdom. And it's in Jesus' name that we pray this. Amen.