Show Notes
2 Samuel 19:14 - 20:26
Pastor Christopher Chelpka
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:06] Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for revealing these things to us in the light of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Thank you for tabernacling among us, being present with us, being Emmanuel, God with us, so that we might have all pleasures and delights from your right hand, that all of the troubles and trials of this life might be turned by your power and into blessings and sanctification for us.
[00:00:35] Lord. We pray with thankfulness and hearts filled with praise for all that you have done, are doing and promised to do. We ask that you would continue to confirm these things, help us to understand them and impress them on our hearts as we hear your word read and preached. Help us not to trust in our own personal power and self sufficiency, but in the promises of your almighty love and your infinite grace.
[00:01:05] We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
[00:01:10] Please be seated and turn your attention to Second Samuel, chapter 19, verse 41.
[00:01:25] It.
[00:01:58] So second Samuel, chapter 19, verse 41 and then I will read through the end of the next chapter.
[00:02:09] Here we have a continuation of what we saw last time that as David begins to return to power, the unity that we might hope for at this point is not there. In fact, there are a number of problems, many ways in which people are misunderstanding the power of the Kingdom of God, something we'll Explore this morning.
[00:02:36] 2 Samuel 19:41 begins with an argument.
[00:02:42] Then all the people of Israel came out to the king, and said to the king, and why have our brothers, the men of Judah, stolen you away and brought you or brought the king and his household over the Jordan, and all David's men with him?
[00:02:55] And all the men of Judah answered the men of Israel, because the king is our close relative. Why then are you angry over this matter? Have we eaten at all at the king's expense, or has he given us any gift? And the men of Israel answered the men of Judah, we have 10 shares in the king, and and in David also we have more than you. Why then did you despise us? We were not the first to speak Were we not the first to speak of bringing back our king?
[00:03:23] But the words of the men of Judah were fiercer than the words of the men of Israel.
[00:03:29] Now there happened to be a worthless man, whose name was Sheba, the son of Beer Key, a Benjaminite and he blew the trumpet and said, we have no portion in David, and we have no inheritance in the son of Jesse. Every man to his tents, O Israel.
[00:03:45] So all the men of Israel withdrew from David and followed Sheba, the son of Bichri. But the men of Judah followed their king steadfastly from the Jordan to Jerusalem.
[00:03:56] And David came to his house at Jerusalem. And the King took the 10 concubines whom he had left to care for the house and put them in a house under guard and provided for them.
[00:04:06] But he did not go into them.
[00:04:08] So they were shut up until the day of their death, living as if in widowhood.
[00:04:14] Then the king said to Amasa, call the men of Judah together to me within three days, and be here yourself.
[00:04:23] So Amasa went to summon Judah, but he delayed beyond the set time that had been appointed to him.
[00:04:30] And David said to Abishai, now Sheba, the son of Bichri will do more harm than Absalom.
[00:04:36] Take your Lord's servants and pursue him, lest he get himself to fortified cities and escape from us.
[00:04:43] And there went out after him Joab's men and the Cherethites and the Pelethites and all the mighty men, they went out from Jerusalem to pursue Sheba the son of Birki.
[00:04:52] When they were at the great stone that is at Gibeon, Amasa came to meet them.
[00:04:58] Now Joab was wearing a soldier's garment, and over it was a belt with a sword in its sheath fastened on his side. And as he went forward, it fell out.
[00:05:10] And Joab said to Amasa, is it well with you, my brother?
[00:05:14] And Joab took Amasa by the beard with his right hand to kiss him.
[00:05:19] But Amasa did not observe the sword that was in Joab's hand.
[00:05:24] So Joab struck him with it in the stomach and spilled his entrails to the ground without striking a second blow. And he died.
[00:05:34] Then Joab and Abishai's brother pursued Sheba the son of Beerki as one of Joab's young men took his stand by Amasa and said, whoever favors Joab and whoever is for David, let him follow Joab.
[00:05:47] And Amasa lay wallowing in his blood in the highway. And anyone who came by seeing him stopped.
[00:05:55] And when the men saw that all the people stopped, or when the man saw that all the people stopped, he carried Amasa out of the highway into the field and threw a garment over him.
[00:06:05] When he was taken out of the highway, all the people went on after Joab to pursue Sheba, son of Beer. Kim and Sheba passed through all the tribes of Israel to Abel, to Beth Maachah, and all the Bichrites assembled and followed him in.
[00:06:22] And all the men who were with Joab came and besieged him in Abel of Beth Maachah.
[00:06:28] They cast up a mound against the city, and it stood against the rampart. And they were battering the wall to throw it down.
[00:06:35] Then a wise woman called from the city, listen, listen. Tell Joab come here that I may speak to you.
[00:06:43] And he came near her. And the woman said, are you Joab? He answered, I am.
[00:06:49] Then she said to him, listen to the words of your servant. And he answered, I am listening.
[00:06:54] Then she said, they used to say in former times, let them but ask counsel at Abel.
[00:07:01] And so they settled a matter.
[00:07:03] I am one of those who are peaceable and faithful in Israel.
[00:07:07] You seek to destroy a city that is a mother in Israel.
[00:07:12] Why will you swallow up the heritage of the Lord?
[00:07:15] Joab answered, far be it from me, far be it that I should swallow up or destroy. That is not true. But a man from the hill country of Ephraim called Sheba the son of Beer Ki, has lifted up his hand against King David.
[00:07:29] Give up him alone, and I will withdraw from the city.
[00:07:33] And the woman said to Joab, behold, his head shall be thrown to you over the wall.
[00:07:38] Then the woman went to all the people in her wisdom, and they cut off the head of Sheba the son of Beer key, and threw it out to Joab. So he blew the trumpet and they dispersed from the city, every man to his home. And Joab returned to Jerusalem to the king.
[00:07:54] Now Joab was in command of all the army of Israel. And Benaiah the son of Jehoiada was in command of the Cherethites and the Pelethites. And Adaram was in charge of the forced labor. And Jehoshaphat the son of Ahilud was the recorder, and Shiva was the secretary, and Zadok and Abiathar were priests. And Ira the Jite was also David's priest.
[00:08:16] May God bless his word to us.
[00:08:27] Wow.
[00:08:28] All right, lots happening here.
[00:08:32] Last time we considered this point, as I mentioned before, that as David comes back to return to Jerusalem after this rebellion from Absalom, there were cracks beginning to form ways in which we see people coming, calling David back.
[00:08:50] And yet the unity wasn't there that you would hope to see. Lack of true unity that only Jesus would be able to finally resolve and is resolving and has resolved in his own flesh.
[00:09:06] And how did he do that? Do you remember what I said last week? He does it by knowing and understanding the core problem, which is our sin, the enmity in our heart against God. And he solves that by forgiving us, by turning away God's wrath, and by being a propitiation and expiation for our sin.
[00:09:32] That's what Jesus is ultimately going to do, and that's what we're hoping for as we feel the tension and the disillusionment and the frustrations that are happening in the kingdom of God at this point in his history.
[00:09:46] One of the things that we can focus on there are a number of things, but one of the things that we can focus on this morning is this particular aspect in which people are trusting in the power of man over the promise of God. Trusting in the power of man over the promise of God.
[00:10:06] We see that in a number of ways, and we see the effects of that, the unhelpfulness of it, the danger of it in a number of ways.
[00:10:14] First, we see it in verses 41 through the end of that chapter, in chapter 19.
[00:10:21] How do we see that here? How are people trusting in the power of man rather than the promise of God?
[00:10:27] Well, we see it in their arguing, we see it in their fighting.
[00:10:31] They're essentially racing to be kind of first in line when it comes to bringing back David, to proving their loyalty, right? But it's all a big show. They're arguing back and forth about who is more loyal and who belongs to him more after so many of them had just been. Been disloyal and just deserted. But instead of focusing their eyes on what the Lord is doing in David, instead of praising the Lord for keeping his promises, instead of trusting the Lord, they're jockeying for position among themselves. Why did you push us out? We should have been first. No, we should have been first. And then at the end of it, when Sheba arrives, which is another issue, so many of them, especially in Israel, depart again, which tells us that there are heart issues going on here. And they're relying not on God's promises to his anointed son, David. They're not relying on the promises that God has made to David that through him he would establish a kingdom of peace, a kingdom of unity, a kingdom fulfilling the promises made all the way back to Abraham.
[00:11:38] Instead of that, they're thinking about themselves. They're thinking about their own lives. And they're trying to use their own resources and their own power and their own rhetoric and speech and swords to get the safety they want, the security they want, the power they want. They're trusting in themselves.
[00:12:00] We see that happening in another way with this man Sheba, and all those who follow him.
[00:12:06] Now, that might sound familiar. It's later on, Solomon will be met by the queen of Sheba that's from a place here. It's describing his name. Different. Different connection. But his name is Sheba. He's the son of Bikri, a Benjaminite. He is one of the people of Israel. And he does exactly what Absalom just did and got defeated by the Lord. For right just after the rebellion was squashed, after David is coming back, after the Lord's power is shown in all of this, he, in his blindness, in his foolishness, decides to do exactly the same thing. And this is such an important reminder for us.
[00:12:53] This is what sin does.
[00:12:55] It makes us kind of crazy. It makes us do things that don't make sense. It makes us rebel against the most powerful being in all the universe, the one who created us, the one who is infinitely more powerful than us, the one who controls all of the world, all the creatures, all of their actions.
[00:13:18] And sin says, I'll go my own way.
[00:13:23] I don't have any portion in that.
[00:13:25] I can't trust this. I don't want that. I'm going to do my own thing. And worse than that, it calls others then to follow in that.
[00:13:35] As Paul says in a similar passage in Romans, he talks about men who not only approve of sin, but encourage and call others to it as well.
[00:13:47] Sheba is trusting in the power of man, specifically his own power, his own abilities, just like Absalom does.
[00:13:59] You know this in my Bible here, the editors talk about this as the rebellion of Sheba, and it certainly is that. But Sheba is kind of a background character here. We don't see him really doing much, trying much. He starts this rebellion. And then the focus of the attention of the narrator shifts to Joab. In a way, it kind of undermines what he's doing.
[00:14:24] It shows us that Sheba never stood a chance.
[00:14:27] He goes out and he does this thing.
[00:14:30] He finds almost zero success in it.
[00:14:35] Self sufficiency, trusting in himself, trusting in his own power, ends in defeat. As it does for every single person.
[00:14:44] Those who say it out loud and do it really openly, in an extreme way. And those who do it quietly hide it in their hearts.
[00:14:54] Either way, when we decide that we're going to trust in ourselves instead of the Lord, we are destined to failure. We are destined to judgment. These are the consequences for sin. Because the Lord is righteous, the Lord protects his people.
[00:15:11] And so we have this rebellion of Sheba. He calls away the men of Israel. They follow after him. They go to this particular town of Abel, find some safety there in its walls, its fortified, strong walls.
[00:15:28] But Joab is breaking down that wall.
[00:15:32] Until a woman, wise, not worthless like Sheba is, a wise woman, senses the danger, senses the loss, understands it in terms of the Lord and his promises, and says, shall the heritage of Israel be destroyed?
[00:15:48] She's not just concerned about her own self protection or the protection of the city. She's understanding it in a theological way, in a God centered way.
[00:16:00] And she comes up with a plan to rid the city of this sinner in a very dramatic way, right? They throw his head over the wall and then Joab goes his own way.
[00:16:16] The last place we see the power of man being trusted over the promises of God is of course course, in Joab himself.
[00:16:26] We've talked about him in a number of ways as we've gone throughout Samuel.
[00:16:31] Joab, this relative of David, Joab, this mighty man, Joab, this one who has done great things in the name of David, in the name of the Lord, and yet he continually seems to be trusting in his own personal power, his politics, his position, rather than trusting in the promise of God.
[00:16:54] How do we see that in this passage?
[00:16:57] Well, you remember that God. I'm sorry, David had just put Amasa in charge of the army. He had demoted Joab.
[00:17:10] These men are on the same side.
[00:17:14] They are both generals in the same army under the command of David.
[00:17:20] And when he sees this opportunity to strike him down, he takes it.
[00:17:26] This is the second time now that Joab has done this. Remember, he also killed Abner, another one of David's generals. Remember that? He also killed Absalom, David's son.
[00:17:40] This is a man who will do whatever it takes to secure his own position.
[00:17:47] The interesting thing about Joab, to me, anyway, hopefully to you, the interesting thing about him is that unlike Sheba, who's doing it in, in this very openly rebellious way, exercising, entrusting his own power over the promises of God, Joab's doing it the same, the same thing, but he's doing it within the context of the kingdom.
[00:18:13] He seems to be on the right side. He seems to be fighting for David. He seems to be fighting for the Lord, but instead he's using David. He's using the kingdom of God for his own purposes and his own plans and his own desires.
[00:18:32] It's like he's riding the coattails of the promises or riding the coattails of David, or attaching himself in some ways to these things, when what he really cares about is his own security, his own place, his own desires and dreams. He's trusting in his power and his ability over and over again, instead of the promises of God.
[00:18:57] Instead of waiting on God's providence, instead of waiting and trusting on God to make things right, he often chooses sinful shortcuts. He chooses a place times for disobedience.
[00:19:13] Rather than trust in all these ways, we see people within the kingdom itself jockeying for power, trusting their own power, looking to their own self sufficiency, rather than trusting that the Lord knows what he's doing and the Lord will accomplish all good things in his time and following him and obeying Him.
[00:19:44] When we reflect on that over and against the power of God, there's a few things that we see they're very important.
[00:19:52] One of them we've already mentioned and it's sort of the obvious one. It's not a battle you're going to win.
[00:19:59] Anytime that you decide to go up against the Lord and His anointed, you will not succeed.
[00:20:09] This seems like an obvious thing. It's spoken of and there's so many examples in the scriptures of this. But it's important for us to take a moment and not just stand in judgment over these men or other people who do these kinds of things, but brothers and sisters, to look at our own hearts, look at our own hearts and the ways that we say, I don't want to do that.
[00:20:31] I want to do my own thing in my own way, in my own time.
[00:20:35] I don't trust God will provide, for example, a way out of this temptation.
[00:20:42] As we read earlier in First Corinthians, instead, I'm just going to give in to it.
[00:20:47] I don't trust God that when I put on his armor, he can help me put out the flaming darts of the evil one.
[00:20:55] Whenever we say, I don't trust that God will get me through this situation, and so I'm going to take this sinful shortcut and just take care of this myself and get the pain over with and get the suffering over with.
[00:21:07] Whenever we take up vengeance in our own arms and we say in our own hands and say, God's not taking care of this, he's not going to take care of this, and so I'm going to take care of this.
[00:21:18] Anytime we do these things and many others, from covetousness to adultery to lying, anytime we say we're going to go our own way and do our own thing and desire the things that we want instead of the things that God wants, we're doing the very same things and we're trusting in our own ability and our own power to secure the things that we think we need.
[00:21:42] The Scripture calls us to something Else first it warns us against that and says that this is a dangerous path. But the scriptures also tell us something else.
[00:21:53] Not only that God will come in judgment against these sins, but that God comes in the person of Jesus in this amazing way in which he uses his power to shame our power to make. To show the true weakness of man and the power of God to bring about the forgiveness of sins.
[00:22:20] Now, how does he do this?
[00:22:23] Well, he does it by coming into the world, by bringing forth this offspring of David, this Jesus Christ our Savior, who will establish this throne.
[00:22:35] Jesus comes into the world, and Jesus is the Son of God, right? He is God with infinite power, infinite resources, able to do everything and anything that his righteous will desires.
[00:22:52] And then he comes into the world and he lays aside so much of that glory for the sake of obeying in our place, for the sake of obedience.
[00:23:04] And in that obedience, he suffers all kinds of things. He's tempted by Satan, he's betrayed by his people.
[00:23:11] And he encounters people, his own disciples, who try to do very similar things that we see in this passage.
[00:23:20] James and John, for example.
[00:23:22] There's a moment in Jesus ministry where they kind of get aside.
[00:23:27] They kind of get Jesus in a corner, take him aside. That's the right way to say it. And they say, hey, when you come into your kingdom, can I be on your right hand and can I be on your left hand?
[00:23:39] They don't want the other disciples to hear this because they'll all know what they're trying to do, right? And when the disciples hear it, they get mad, right? They. There's this sense in which they're trying to use their positions of closeness and intimacy, their connections and their rhetoric with Jesus to establish their places in the kingdom of God. But that's not how you get established in the kingdom of God. That's not how we get peace or joy or safety or anything that we need.
[00:24:08] We receive those blessings purely by the grace of God, giving it to us by the promises of God that are made to us in Jesus Christ.
[00:24:17] Jesus makes this point with them.
[00:24:21] There's another time when Peter promises to go forth and do the work of the Lord with the sword.
[00:24:30] Jesus ends that.
[00:24:32] It's not about power.
[00:24:34] He says to Peter, put your sword away.
[00:24:40] The kingdom of God is going to come in this strange form, a form of weakness, a form of suffering, a form of trial, of persecution. A form which is centered around the death of the king.
[00:24:57] And yet in that death, in the death of the king, in the death of the Son of David, that's how God overcomes death and sin and the evil one.
[00:25:11] God uses what is weak and foolish in the world to shame the wise, to shame those who would seek to rely on their power and on their wisdom and on their might to secure the things of the kingdom of God.
[00:25:26] But God wants us to see in the person, in the work of Jesus, that our hope is not in ourselves, but it's in Him.
[00:25:36] And those promises are all vindicated and proven in many ways throughout his life and ministry.
[00:25:43] But we might say in a special way, when he resurrected from the dead and he rose into heaven, and he sits now at the right hand of God interceding for us. And as we confessed earlier in the Nicene Creed, he's coming again with, with glory to judge the living and the dead.
[00:26:05] The glory and the power of God is made manifest in various ways in great power and glory, right? The defeat of Pharaoh and his army, the flood, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, all kinds of various ways throughout history. Nothing is going to compare, though, with the visible power and glory that comes with the coming of Jesus.
[00:26:29] But our hope is not that when Jesus comes, he will look at our good works, he will look at our wisdom and he will look at our strength and say, yeah, you are one of the special ones. I'm going to save you.
[00:26:43] Because we're not saved by our good works. We're not saved by our power, we're saved by His.
[00:26:49] And so what does he call us to do?
[00:26:51] Where does salvation come from?
[00:26:54] It comes from trusting in him and the promises that he's made in which he says, lean on me, trust me, follow me, and I will secure your place.
[00:27:07] I will make you safe, I will give you peace, I will give you rest.
[00:27:14] Our sin and Satan would constantly seek to have us deny that, constantly wants us and is waging war against the Spirit. To say, you can't believe that. Don't trust that. Go out on your own, establish your own thing. Work on your own power.
[00:27:35] Brothers and sisters, it's simply not true.
[00:27:39] The only way to have salvation, the only way to be secure in Zion, in the kingdom of heaven, the only way to have intimacy with God is by trusting in the promises of his grace and his love.
[00:27:54] And the Scriptures guarantee by his person and by his work that God will not fail to fulfill those promises. And we can be absolutely sure of our hope in Him.
[00:28:10] So put your trust in him, in all the little details of life and the big things of life, whether you're making a decision or reading the newspaper.
[00:28:20] Trust in him.
[00:28:22] Trust in him to do the things he said. Trust in Jesus to do the things that he has promised. He will not fail you.
[00:28:30] Let's pray and thank our Lord, our Heavenly Father. We ask that you would help us not to put our trust in our weakness, in our sinfulness, in our foolishness and in our pride.
[00:28:44] Instead, Lord, we ask that you would humble us and even put these things to death in us so that we might enjoy the life that is promised to us in Christ through faith.
[00:29:00] Lord, you don't need our power to establish your kingdom. It is established for us in Jesus Christ, your spirit working and bringing out the benefits of it and drawing out your flock and your people and changing hearts and changing lives. All of this according to your great power and strength.
[00:29:22] Lord, help us not to adore ourselves, adore our abilities, as weak and as foolish as they are, but to give all glory and honor to to you and to think the things that you have promised to do.
[00:29:39] Lord, we thank you for this history that is recorded for us so that we might study it and learn from it, learn about the nature of our God, learn of your holy will for our lives and be reminded and assured of the promises that are kept.
[00:29:58] Indeed, you did keep them, for you established David on his throne, Solomon after him, and one day, finally bringing all things to a perfect conclusion.
[00:30:09] Jesus Christ our Savior. It's in his name that we pray. Amen.
