Saul's Rash Vow

[00:00:00] Pray and ask for God to illumine our hearts that we might hear his word, believe it and obey it. Let's pray. [00:00:12] Heavenly Father, we thank you that you not only command us to teach our children diligently the things you have spoken, but you do this work perfectly yourself, a teaching to us all the time and in so many ways. The things that you have done, the nature of your being, the work of your hands, the promises of the future. [00:00:40] Lord, you speak this word in the you speak the word about yourself, about your sovereign power, your divine nature, the law that you call us to, even in nature itself. You call us and all the world to look around on the things that you have made and to give you glory. [00:01:02] You teach us through the trees and the stars, through the events that happen in the world. By the hand of your providence, by your providential hand, you reveal to us on the things that you would have us do, your great power and many other things. [00:01:23] And then on top of all of this, Lord, you give us more wisdom, greater wisdom in the Scriptures, preaching to us the good news of the gospel of your Son, our wisdom, who came to save us out from under our sin and to reveal to us a way of salvation away from out from under the curse and from our disobedience. He shows us your abounding love and we ask that you would help us to see his power and his glory and the work of his hands. Even here in our chapter about Saul today, we ask that you would open our hearts that we might understand and believe and follow wisely, even as you are wise. We confess that we are your children. Make us more like you and take care of us. Oh Heavenly Father, we pray this in Jesus name. Amen. [00:02:26] Let's turn to First Samuel, Chapter 14. [00:02:30] You can remain standing if you're able. And we are going to hear the second part of this very dramatic story, the first which we covered last time, where Saul's son Jonathan goes into battle without Saul's knowledge, defeats a garrison of Philistines and creates much commotion in the camp and beyond. It's not only Jonathan as we saw, that creates this commotion, as I put it, there's probably better words, but it's God himself who shakes the earth and shakes the hearts of men as he shows his power through his servants that work. This battle having begun, we read of the rest of that day and even a little bit beyond in beginning, in verse 24 where we will start. Now let's hear God's word. [00:03:30] And the men of Israel had been hard pressed that day so Saul laid an oath on the people, saying, cursed be the man who eats food until it is evening and I am avenged on my enemies. So none of the people had tasted food. [00:03:48] Now when all the people came to the forest, behold, there was honey on the ground. And when the people entered the forest, behold, the honey was dropping. But no one put his hand to his mouth, for the people feared the oath. [00:04:02] But Jonathan had not heard his father charge the people with the oath. So he put out the tip of the staff. He put out the tip of the staff that was in his hands and dipped it in the honeycomb and put his hand to his mouth, and his eyes became bright. Then one of the people said, you, father strictly charged the people with an oath, saying, cursed be the man who eats food this day. [00:04:27] And the people were faint. [00:04:29] Then Jonathan said, my father has troubled the land. See how my eyes have become bright because I tasted a little of this honey. How much better if the people had eaten freely today of the spoil of their enemies that they found. For now the defeat among the Philistines has not been great. [00:04:48] They struck down the Philistines that day from Michmash to Aijalon, and the people were very faint. The people pounced on the spoil and took sheep and oxen and calves and slaughtered them on the ground. And the people ate them with the blood. [00:05:06] Then they told Saul, behold, the people are sinning against the Lord by eating with the blood. And he said, you have dealt treacherously. Roll a great stone to me here. [00:05:19] And Saul said, disperse yourselves among the people and say to them, let every man bring his ox or his sheep and slaughter them here and eat. And do not sin against the Lord by eating with the blood. [00:05:30] So every one of the people brought his ox with him that night, and they slaughtered them there. And Saul built an altar to the Lord. It was the first altar that he built to the Lord. [00:05:42] Then Saul said, let us go down after the Philistines by night and plunder them until morning light. Let us not leave a man of them. And they said, do whatever seems good to you. But the priest said, let us draw near to God here. And Saul inquired of God, shall I go down after the Philistines? Will you give them into the hand of Israel? But he did not answer him that day. And Saul said, come here, all you leaders of the people, and know and see how this sin has arisen today. For as the Lord lives, who saves Israel, though it be in Jonathan my son, he shall surely die. [00:06:21] But there was not a man among all the People who answered him. Then he said to all Israel, you shall be on one side, and I and Jonathan my son will be on the other side. And the people said to Saul, do what seems good to you. [00:06:35] Therefore Saul said, o Lord God of Israel, why have you not answered your servant this day? If this guilt is in me or in Jonathan my son, O Lord, God of Israel, give Urim. But if this guilt is in your people of Israel, give Thummim. And Jonathan and his son were taken, but the people escaped. Then Saul said, cast the lot between me and my son Jonathan. And Jonathan was taken. [00:07:01] Then Saul said to Jonathan, tell me what you have done. And Jonathan told him, I tasted a little honey with the tip of the staff that was in my hand. Here I am. I will die. [00:07:14] And Saul said, God, do so to me. And more also. You shall surely die, Jonathan. Then the people said to Saul, shall Jonathan die, who has worked this great salvation in Israel, far from it, as the Lord lives there, shall not one day of his or one hair of his head fall to the ground, for he has worked with God this day. So the people ransomed Jonathan so that he did not die. [00:07:41] Then Saul went up from pursuing the Philistines. And the Philistines went to their own place. When Saul had taken the kingship over Israel, he fought against all the enemies on every side. Against Moab, against the Ammonites, against Edom, against the kings of Zoba, against the Philistines. Wherever he turned, he routed them, and he did valiantly and struck the Amalekites and delivered Israel out of the hands of those who plundered them. Now, the sons of Saul were Jonathan and Ishvi Malkishua. And the names of his two daughters were these. The names of the firstborn was Merab. And the name of the younger, Michael. And the name of Saul's wife was Ahinoam, the daughter of Ahimaaz. And the name of the commander of his army was Abner, the son of ner. Saul's uncle Kish was the father of Saul. And ner, the father of Abner was the son of Abiel. There was hard fighting against the Philistines all the days of Saul. And when Saul saw any strong man or valiant man, he attached him to himself. [00:08:42] May God bless his word to us. You may be seated. [00:09:16] I want to begin by having you think about this phrase. Do whatever seems good to you. [00:09:25] This is a very strong phrase in my mind. It's kind of. It's up there with one of the other phrase you can have up to half my kingdom. [00:09:36] He's like, whoa, that's a really strong thing to say. [00:09:42] Do whatever seems good to you. [00:09:46] And when we think about the Lord, our king, this is a very good thing to say. [00:09:54] Do whatever seems good to you. This is the kind of thing that you want to just let be rolling off your lips and off your heart. If we could put it that way, out of your heart, that's probably better all the time. Do whatever seems good to you. There's other ways we put this right. As the Lord wills, on earth as it is in heaven. Do whatever seems good to you. Now, we can say that without any caveats or hesitance or holding back to the Lord, because he's the Lord. You know, as we talked about earlier, he's the great king, perfectly wise, good in everything he does. To say that to a human, though, is to say a lot. [00:10:39] It means there's a lot of trust there. Jonathan's armor bearer said that to him, something similar to it back in the beginning of the chapter. You know, Jonathan had a plan. His armor says, I'm with you, heart and soul. Do what is in your heart. And we see the people saying something similar to Saul now twice in the. In the chapter or in the half that we read. [00:11:02] Do what seems good to you. Do what seems good to you. [00:11:06] They're trusting Saul as the armor bearer trusted Jonathan. And as we are called, all of us are called to trust God. [00:11:15] The contrast here is between. Between Jonathan and Saul is quite great. [00:11:23] And God wants us to see that and start thinking about these things as well as. And ultimately the contrast between Saul and Jesus, Saul and our great king. [00:11:35] And one of the things that we see is that the trust that is put in Jonathan was well placed. Jonathan was successful. Jonathan sought the Lord. But when it comes to Saul, this trust falls flat. [00:11:50] I don't think. Well, never mind. I'll leave it at that. [00:11:55] And so when we read the story and we hear the story, we want to think about Saul's actions, which are mixed. We see, on the one hand, a certain kind of obedience when the people are sacrificing the animals. [00:12:14] Perhaps the part of the problem is that they're eating the blood. There's another possibility that they're actually doing a kind of ritual that's sacrificing to other gods. Either way, you take it, they're being disobedient. Saul recognizes that it's a violation of the Lord's commands, and he gets after it. He says, stop, this is wrong. [00:12:35] When he realizes God isn't speaking to him and there's sin among them, he gets after it. He says, we need to figure out where the problem is. And we'll talk about that in a minute. You see these elements, A third we can mention of Saul's doing really well here is he's pursuing the Philistines. This is what he was called to do. It's what he was failing to do. Jonathan kind of got the ball rolling and now Saul's running after it. And that's good. He should be pursuing them. But in this obedience and these parts of obedience, we see a lot of foolishness as well. [00:13:11] One of the things that's worth reflecting on, that I'd like to reflect with you about this morning, is that obedience needs wisdom. [00:13:19] The best obedience is coupled with wisdom. [00:13:24] We don't get that so much with Saul. And in some ways we can see in our Saul becomes a mirror for our own lives. We see ways in which we can also be foolish, just like he is here. [00:13:37] But ultimately, in the contrast between Saul and Jesus, we see and can remember the great wisdom and obedience of our king and how it strengthens our faith in him. [00:13:49] So let's think about this this morning. [00:13:52] Let's think about the actions of Saul and the kind of situation that he's in and the decisions he's called to make and think about some things that we might learn from that. [00:14:06] First of all, back at 24, we see that the men of Israel had been hard pressed that day. This is the same day in which Jonathan routed the Philistines. As I said, things were difficult, though it wasn't all easy. As they were pursuing the Philistines, they didn't just let this garrison fall, they were trying to push them out of the land. [00:14:29] And things are hard. People are getting tired. What does Saul decide to do? Saul is their leader. As their commander decides to do this. He decides to force them all to fast. [00:14:44] And he does it by saying this. Cursed be the man who eats food until this evening. So it's a limited period of time. He says, nobody's going to eat until it's evening. And I am an event. I am avenged on my enemies. [00:14:59] Now that's an interesting way of saying things. When we were reading about Jonathan and his fight against the Philistines, we heard him talking about things in terms of the Lord, the Lord's battle, the Lord's fight, these kind of things and Saul's, as you can see, something's a little different in his perspective. [00:15:18] Anyway, they're pursuing after the Philistines and he says, cursed be the man who eats food until this evening, and I am avenged, my enemies. Now, this was an. This was an oath that Saul made for himself about all the people, right? This was not an oath that he required all the people to take. This was something he. And a requirement he put on them, right? So you can imagine the commander looking at his armies and saying, no one's eating until we get this thing done, right? [00:15:51] And you can see a certain kind of wisdom in that, right? [00:15:57] We've had meetings before. I've had meetings. You've had meetings where we say, all right, we're gonna just skip lunch, power through this thing. We're gonna get this done, right? There can be wisdom in that, but not in this instance. And we soon see why. We see what happens. [00:16:16] Well, Saul puts this. [00:16:19] Demands this curse be upon everyone some sort of penalty. And this is an. And this is not just a kingly penalty. This is a religious thing that he's saying, cursed be. May God curse anyone who does this. This is what we would call an oath. [00:16:38] And it's a very serious thing. [00:16:41] It's something that you can't go back on. But that's a problem. [00:16:46] A friend of mine, a pastor, used this analogy of. It's like writing a blank check. [00:16:52] You make this promise, you say you're going to do something, but if you don't have the funds to actually carry it out, you put yourself in a bind. [00:17:02] And this is what foolishness does. It pursues after ends in bad ways that creates bad results. Well, the people are afraid. They do not want to be cursed. And none of them eat food. [00:17:15] Now, if you've ever been in a situation where you've been working really hard and you've been maybe even working out, or you've been at your desk all day or whatever it is, and you're getting hungry and you're getting tired, and then somebody brings in a big plate of sandwiches into the office or something like that. It can be hard to resist. [00:17:40] It can be hard to resist. Now, what happens to the people? They come into the forest, and it's dripping with honey. [00:17:47] It's an extreme thing. What an amazing thing to see, right? Honey on the ground, honey in the trees. Sometimes we talk about Israel as the land flowing with milk and honey. And here it is. Here's one instance in a very literal way. There's delicious food all around them. And this is easy to eat. It's really fast. You don't have to prepare it or make it, or you just eat it. As you go. It's almost the perfect food, right, for an army that is tired. [00:18:25] But Saul just said all of us would be cursed if we eat. [00:18:32] And these men do not put a hand in their mouth, for they feared the oath. [00:18:41] Now, Jonathan we read, had not heard the oath. And being a smart soldier, instead of refusing to eat, when he needs to eat, he eats and it helps him. [00:18:52] He didn't hear the oath. He didn't know what was going on, so he had no reason to be cautious about it. In fact, he was being very wise and smart. And we read that his. [00:19:03] His eyes became bright. [00:19:06] And we know that this is not just an understanding or a spiritual brightness. This is a physical thing that's happening. We see it in a bunch of different ways, but particularly in the way it's contrasted with being faint, right? The people we read were faint. And then again in verse 31, the people were very faint. And you see this in people's eyes, you know, unfortunately, and by the providence of God, I've been sick for like two months. Feeling much better now. I'm very thankful for it. Thank you for your prayers and help. [00:19:41] But you know when you see somebody sick, and sometimes when you see yourself sick, you look at, you're like, I just don't look well. Or you see it in something that they just don't look well. And often it's the eyes that kind of show it. So I was like, look at, I'm feeling better. You can see it in my face. You can see it in my eyes. [00:20:00] They were bright. He was feeling good, but no one else took. [00:20:06] Now the story kind of pauses the thing about the honey for a moment and moves on with the events and then comes back to it because we have this sort of issue hanging, right? What happened? Right? So Jonathan ate of this, and what is going to become of that? Well, no one knows it. We continue on. They strike down in verse 31, the Philistines. From Michmash to Aijalon. This is a long way, 20 plus miles. [00:20:32] Can you imagine today walking 20 miles more? [00:20:38] How about doing it with armor? How about doing it while fighting people all along the way, not just walking, but chasing. How about doing it without food? These people are tired, hungry people. [00:20:55] So when evening finally comes and they've been collecting spoil all the way, another one of the tasks that they've been doing, they're not just on a walk, they're. They're pursuing an army. They have various sheep and oxen and calves. They slaughter them on the ground and the people eat them with the blood. [00:21:13] And as I said, there's a couple possibilities here. Perhaps not letting the blood drain out or perhaps draining it out to gods of the underworld. We get that from other practices, but also some of the ways that the Hebrew potentially reads with them sacrificing not just with the blood, but perhaps like over the blood or something like that. [00:21:36] Either way, it's very clear that they were sinning against the Lord. And Saul is. Solves this problem. He calls them out on it and then he brings a stone for them to sacrifice on. [00:21:48] In verse 35, it says, this was the first altar that Saul built. [00:21:54] Whenever you have little details like this, you want to ask yourself, why is he telling us this? [00:22:00] Why is he telling us that this is the first altar built? There's a couple possibilities I can think of. Maybe you can think of others. One is that it's. It's. It's indicating that there's a certain lateness of this. Maybe it begs the question, why is this the first altar that Saul has built after being king for some time? Another possibility is it gets us prepared for some things that are going to happen in a moment with other. In the story, with other sacrifices that happen. It highlights our. It focuses our attention and gets us thinking about what is Saul doing? How does he approach these sacrifices? It gets us being. It prepares us for something that's coming. And so you can be listening for that. [00:22:46] Well, all of that happens. And then we get to verse 36 and Saul says this. Let us go down after the Philistines by night and plunder them, right? So you have been going all day long, most of that day, without food. You finally eat a little bit. And what's Saul's next plan? Keep going. [00:23:09] On the one hand, you could admire his zeal, right? He wants to get the job done and perhaps that's a good thing. But it seems to be backfiring. [00:23:20] He seems to not be reading. Well, the situation, the needs of his men, other things that are going on. [00:23:28] They respond by saying, do whatever seems good to you. The priest says, could we pause for a second? [00:23:35] Could we just stop and ask God? [00:23:41] Or as it says here, let us draw near to God. [00:23:46] You see a pattern emerging in Saul. A pattern that is foolish. A pattern of quick, rash decisions, emotional decisions that aren't grounded in things that are going on and the needs of his people in principles that are. That have. That have been called to, that he's been called to. [00:24:05] This is why the wisdom is a part of this in a way, at sort of like one level, Saul is pursuing these things and is pursuing the right things another way, in other ways. He seems to be doing it in very, very rash ways. [00:24:24] When he's afraid, he's super afraid. And he's hiding among the baggage, he's hiding in caves, he's running away. And when he's feeling brave, he just goes for it without thinking, making this, as we'll see, this crazy oath, without thinking about its consequences. [00:24:45] No one's going to eat. He doesn't think about the needs that they currently have. He doesn't think about what might happen as a result of that, about who may or may not have heard. He just says it. [00:24:57] And then, as we'll see in a moment, well, we'll get there. I'm sorry. So he says, do whatever seems good to you. The priest says, let's pause and let's think about it. Then what happens? The Lord doesn't answer. [00:25:12] We've seen this kind of thing before. When he was waiting for Samuel to come to get instructions from the Lord, and Samuel wasn't there right away. What happened before, Saul just pushed forward. And then things went bad. He ended up hearing from the Lord that he would lose his throne here. He recognizes something's off and that's good. [00:25:38] The Lord doesn't answer. And Saul says, there's a problem among us. [00:25:44] The Lord is not speaking because there's some problems. What he doesn't recognize is the problem is with him. [00:25:51] He made this foolish oath, which he has not kept because he doesn't know that he's not keeping it. So what does he do? He uses the Urim and the Thummim, these stones that were used by the priests that the Lord would use through the priests for divining the will of the Lord. A casting of the lots. Now, normally, or at least in other places of Scripture, when we see this happening, Israel would be brought forth by tribes, clans, and it would be narrowed down until you get to an individual person. And we say, okay, this is the person here. Saul just sets himself and Jonathan one to one side and the people to another. [00:26:33] I might be wrong, but to me it seems like he's being presumptuous that he knows it's not among him. And Jonathan, we can just kind of take ourselves out of this equation. Equation. And we'll deal with the people over here. [00:26:46] But very quickly, he realizes the problem is with him and his household. They cast the lots. And as it says, Jonathan and Saul are taken, the lot falls to them and the people escape. [00:26:59] Right? So the People are not chosen, so there's only two. This process is going fast. They do it again, and it's Jonathan. [00:27:08] And then Jonathan says, that's in verse 42. Cast the lot between me and my son, Jonathan. Jonathan is taken. Saul looks at Jonathan and says, tell me what you've done. [00:27:21] And Jonathan says, I tasted a little of honey with the tip of my staff that was in my hand. Here I am. I will die. [00:27:29] This is quite remarkable. [00:27:33] Jonathan doesn't say, I didn't hear it. I didn't know what was going on. I can't be responsible. He knows he's not responsible for not hearing it. He knows he didn't do anything wrong. But Saul made an oath. [00:27:48] He made an oath to God. He made a promise to God, and that is a promise that must be kept. Saul's showing his obedience not only to his father, but more importantly, to the Lord. [00:28:01] He has been dedicated to judgment by the words of his father. [00:28:09] And Saul says, you will surely die. Even makes it stronger, doesn't he? He says, God do so to me. And more also. [00:28:19] Not only may God kill me, but more than kill me, whatever that might mean. You shall surely die. [00:28:29] No tears, no heartache. No. What have I done? No. I'm sorry. [00:28:41] And there's another option. We'll see in a moment. [00:28:44] The men ransom, as it was allowed in the law. They ransom Jonathan. They pay a debt. They pay for the debt, and they ransom him so that he would not have to die. This was a procedure that was allowed in the law. If you vowed something with various objects, a lot of times you could. If you said, okay, I'm going to give this to the Lord, and then you said, wait, never mind. [00:29:10] You could pay the amount of the value plus a fifth was often the practice. But if you vowed something to the Lord here it's a little bit different because it's this curse. But if you vowed something to the Lord and it was a person, you would have to pay the value of that person. Now, of course, people are invaluable, but the law set amounts of various people and various kinds of things to impress on people that you can't just say, well, never mind anyway, there was a debt that could be paid. [00:29:45] And the people say, are you crazy? Not a hair is going to fall from Jonathan's head. This man is with God. This man is saving us. We are not going to put him to death. Everybody pitches in some money. They redeem him out from under the curse. [00:30:01] Why didn't Saul think of this? [00:30:04] He seems to be Concerned about the law. He's concerned about keeping his oath. He's concerned about the sacrifices. Here's his very son in front of him. He's going to put him to death. Why would he not redeem him? Why did the men have to think of this? [00:30:22] Is Saul jealous? [00:30:25] Is Saul just not thinking? [00:30:29] Is Saul so wrapped up in embarrassment? Hard to say. But this man's head is not on straight. [00:30:38] He's not acting wisely, he's acting rashly. He's acting emotionally, he's acting foolishly. [00:30:46] Here he commands his son to die, and Jonathan's fellow soldiers save him. [00:30:55] They redeem him out from under the curse. [00:31:00] And then the story ends by saying that Saul went up from pursuing the Philistines and the Philistines went to their own place. And then we end with various victories of Saul. [00:31:13] Saul, like a lot of us, is kind of a mixed bag, isn't he? There's parts of you that's like, man, he's doing so well, right? He's defeating the Philistines and winning these battles, and he's ruling over his people. And then other parts where you are befuddled at his actions. Why did he wait? Why did he rush? Why is he doing this? Why is he doing that? [00:31:39] It's hard to say. [00:31:41] It can be somewhat fun to psychoanalyze Saul. I don't think that's our main purpose here. [00:31:48] But what we can say is that the king that the Lord would have over his people needs to be wise and he needs to be obedient from the heart. [00:32:01] And that involves all kinds of things. We can recognize and sympathize with Saul. That life is challenging, and sometimes it calls us to choose between some very difficult things. Life isn't always good versus evil. Sometimes it's good versus good. Do I uphold this value that I really think is important, or do I uphold this value? Or do I do it this much or this much? Or what about this third thing? This is where wisdom is required. [00:32:30] What's the right thing to do? How do you do it? When do you do it? [00:32:36] Think back to the beginning of the story, when Saul was seeing his army when he knew they needed to press on, when. When he knew they didn't need to give up, what other options might have he had to motivate them? Rather than placing them all under a curse and taking away food, could he have done anything else? [00:32:58] I think so. [00:32:59] He probably had a number of different options at his hands. You can imagine what those might have been when he was faced with this moment. Of seeing his son Jonathan chosen as the one who had. [00:33:13] Had done something. [00:33:16] Really. Saul having done something, and he sees this, he had other options. [00:33:23] Life can be challenging. It calls us difficult to choose. We need wisdom. The people who lead us need wisdom. And ultimately the king over all humanity, Lord and Savior, needs wisdom. [00:33:40] It can be so easy to lose perspective. [00:33:44] Wisdom sees both the trees and the forest. Wisdom understands principles and their application. Wisdom gathers information, doesn't jump to conclusions, but also doesn't wait too long to act. [00:33:58] These are hard things to do. [00:34:02] Wisdom doesn't just care about getting the job done, but it cares about people. [00:34:07] It wonders how the things that we do will affect others. [00:34:13] When we think about, as we thought about the life of Saul, let's think for just a moment about the life of Jesus. [00:34:21] Jesus is so wonderful in all these regards, because when he speaks and when he acts, he always does this in this perfect way. [00:34:30] Often very surprising people. People will say something and you expect him to come with some response. And then he says another and everybody walks away kind of confused. [00:34:40] Or other times he says something and it's so penetrating. It gets right to the heart of the thing. [00:34:46] And there's other times where you think that he's doing the totally wrong thing, and then it's the totally perfect thing. [00:34:53] And people are often frustrated by it. When Lazarus died, for example, his sisters are like, why aren't you coming? [00:35:01] Why are you waiting? And when he finally arrives, it's like, you're too late. [00:35:07] Of course he calls Lazarus to rise from the dead and much good is done. [00:35:13] We think about the ways that he deals with Peter or Thomas, the people that he deals with on the road, the crowds that he pities and talks to, and ultimately the way the Lord our Savior goes to the cross to show the depth of God's wisdom and his ability to see the big picture and act perfectly and align all things right. [00:35:39] He uses the cross of Christ to accomplish the greatest ends ever. And he redeems us out from under the curse. [00:35:49] A curse that wasn't rash and foolish, but a curse that we rightfully deserve because of our sins, because of our sins that we have known and been aware of as well as those that we didn't know. Things that we have done and committed and piled up on ourselves, even though we've been told a hundred times not to do X or that we must do Y. [00:36:16] Sins that are heinous, grievous, piled up in many ways. Christ redeems us out from all of them by paying the penalty that was Owed. [00:36:28] This is why these things were included back under the Old Covenant Law, to begin to prepare our hearts and our minds for understanding who Jesus is. [00:36:38] And this is who Jesus is, the one who redeems us, who saves us. [00:36:44] This is so important because it reminds us, as I said earlier, God doesn't just say, well, there's sin. We'll just ignore it and move on. He deals with sin, which is so great because sin is terrible, it's evil, it's an offense against God, it breaks relationships, it destroys us, it holds us apart from one another. God deals with sin and he deals with it in Jesus Christ. [00:37:13] Jesus comes in the perfect time and in the perfect way, at the right moment, exercising perfect wisdom and obedience. And as a result of all that, we get to live. [00:37:26] We get to live. [00:37:29] Although we should surely die for great sins that we have committed, although the Lord knows them and can single any one of us out in a moment and put a big list of all the things that we've done, all the things that we've left undone, he saves us. [00:37:51] When we think about this work of our King, his wisdom, his obedience, his power, and the things that he's done, it leads us to thankfulness. I think it should lead us to be thankful that when we say, do whatever seems good to you, Jesus, we don't have to hesitate at all. We don't have to wonder, wasn't he the same guy who was hiding in the baggage a little earlier? [00:38:19] Wasn't he the same one who was just hiding in the caves a little earlier? Wasn't he the same? No. We go, this is our God who has done all things perfectly, all things well, and who promises to come again with glory, to judge the living and and the dead. [00:38:38] And those of us who have put our faith in Christ, those of us who have sought him and put our trust in him, and have called to him and said, lord, do whatever seems good to you. I am in your hands and nothing can separate me from you. And your Father's love He will grant to you and to all who put your faith in Him. Not curse, but blessing eternal life. [00:39:07] So this story leads us to thankfulness. [00:39:10] It leads us to faith and confidence in our King. And it leads us to seek obedience and wisdom, not from ourselves, but in him as we trust in him, as we look to him, as we look to our Heavenly Father. And we say, make me wise, help me not to be foolish, strengthen my obedience. These are prayers that God promises to answer. [00:39:36] The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord trusting in him looking to him for all things. [00:39:45] So as you face various struggles and challenges in your life, as you're not sure what to do, whether to go, whether to wait, whether to act, how strong and when. [00:40:00] The simple encouragement and admonition for all of us is to look to the Lord first and foremost. Start there, trusting in him, trusting in his work, trusting in his promises, listening to the things that he has said. He promises to us that as we seek wisdom from Him, he, he will give it and take care of us and provide for what we need. Let's pray. [00:40:25] Our Heavenly Father, we confess to you our own great foolishness. How often we do not have our heads on straight. Our hearts get all mixed up and we act rashly, foolishly. [00:40:39] Sometimes we pause and we wait in fear. We hide when we should be moving. [00:40:45] We hope that problems will just go away on their own. When you have called us to act and other times, Lord, we act. When you have told us to wait and to listen and to be patient. [00:40:59] We take things into our own hands. We rush into situations we decide to and in the worst cases, Lord, we decide to sin in order to get the things we think we need. [00:41:16] We ask, O Lord, that you would help us. Help us as individuals in our lives and all of our various callings as employers and employees, as children, as parents, as husbands, as wives, as members in your church, as citizens of our city and our nation, and all of these different aspects and callings that we have. We ask, Lord, that you would help us help us to live with eyes that see you, that look to Christ, the author and perfecter of our faith. [00:41:58] Help us to act always in the knowledge that we are in your hands, that you protect us, you keep us, you love us, that you speak to us and give us things to hear and heed. [00:42:12] Help us to live our lives with faith, looking not just the immediate circumstances that are right in front of us, but to that which is in the future and Lord, even to that which is coming, the end of all things and the consummation and the glory of the coming kingdom of God. [00:42:34] Help us to look forward to heaven in life and in death. [00:42:40] Help us to see the big picture, to know that you are working all things for good, for those who are called according to your purpose. [00:42:52] Help us to know that you are doing all things well in all aspects of life and in these things, Lord, we ask that you would help us to walk, to abide in you, to rest in you, to persevere after you give us this confidence in you, O Lord, and we ask that you would give it to our brothers and sisters and to those who do not yet know you. We pray in particular this morning for our evangelists and their various callings, for Brad Pepo coming to Flagstaff soon and beginning work there and trying to start a new church. We ask that you would give him wisdom as he speaks your word, as he invites people into a new worshiping body and Lord. We also pray for your chaplains working in various places, in various contexts, in hospitals and hospice. We pray for these chaplains in military contexts and other places as well. We thank you for creating open doors and opportunities for men to preach the gospel in places that would otherwise not have it or have great difficulty having it. We ask that you would give them skill in navigating these roles and wearing multiple hats at the same time. We ask that your work and your word would be evident and that many would come to you, to faith in you and would give you glory. [00:44:30] We thank you for the opportunities that we've had today to hear your word. We ask that you would give us insight and understanding and greater faith in all these things. We pray in Jesus name, Amen.