March 10, 2025 • 23 mins
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Welcome to the Westside church’s special Monday Morning Coffee podcast with Mark Roberts. Mark is a disciple, a husband, father and grand dad, as well as a certified coffee geek, fan of CS Lewis’ writings and he loves his big red Jeep. He’s also the preacher for Westside church.
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello, and welcome to the Westside churches
special Monday Morning Coffeepodcast on this podcast, our
preacher Mark Roberts will helpyou get your week started
right. With look back atyesterday's sermon so that we
can think through it furtherand better work the
applications into our dailylives . Mark will then look
(00:28):
forward into this week's Biblereading so that we can know
what to expect and watch for.
And, he may have some extrabonus thoughts from time to
time. So grab a cup of coffeeas we start the week together
on Monday Morning Coffee withMark.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the Monday
Morning Coffee podcast forMonday, March 3rd. I'm Mark,
and of course I've got somecoffee, I've got sermon notes,
I've got my Bible and I'm readyto talk about daily Bible
reading in Samuel. I'mrecovered from a huge couple of
days at West Side , tremendousSunday, great preaching
conference last Thursday andFriday. All kinds of great
(01:14):
things are going on as Godworks through his people at
West Side . It's just a joy tobe a part of that. And part of
that is all of you folks wholisten to this podcast and
encourage me so much soeverything is ready. Get some
coffee. Yep . Let's get ready.
Let's get set. Let's go.
(01:35):
Yesterday I preached a lesson.
I think that's tremendouslyhelpful to people about
remembering who we are based onhow God sees us, what's God's
perspective, what does God seewhen he looks at me? Sometimes
we get very down on ourselves.
We struggle with some of that.
I hope yesterday's lessonhelped you. I wanna build out a
little bit more from that firstpoint. In God's perspective,
(01:56):
I'm a forgiven sinner and saintand I wanna make the
application to how we pray forthe forgiveness of our sins.
Sometimes we'll say thingslike, Lord, we're so weak and
we sin often, or we just sinall the time. We fail all the
time. And and I understand someof that language comes because
we're trying to expresshumility and, and there is a
sense in which we fall farshort of the standard of God's
(02:19):
holiness. I understand aboutthat and you should too. But
when we understand about beinga forgiven sinner, I think that
helps us change our language inour praying. Paul says in
Romans six in verse 11, so youalso must consider yourselves
dead to sin and alive to God inChrist Jesus. Let not sin.
(02:39):
Romans six 12. Therefore reignin your mortal body to make you
obey its passions. Paul doesnot see Christians as
constantly falling into sin,constantly struggling with sin
and being beaten by sin. We'reenslaved to sin. We can't do
any better. We never do anybetter. That's not Paul's
perspective. I don't thinkthat's God's perspective. Yes,
(03:01):
you and I will sin from time totime. You know that. And I know
that we're not happy about it.
It's gonna happen. It doeshappen. But when we are
confessing our sins, what wewant to do is talk about how we
didn't want to do that. We'resorry that we did that. We want
God's help to not do thatanymore. And that we know that
with God's help we can overcomebecause we are forgiven sinners
(03:25):
and saints not held captive insin any longer. Think about
that. I hope that will help youin your praying even today. Now
we're turning our Bibles overto the book of First Samuel.
Let's do some Bible reading. Itis Monday and our reading for
(03:57):
Monday is First Samuel chapter25, verses 23 to 44. This is
the conclusion of the NavalAbigail David story. It was
hard to leave this off onThursday last week so that we
could go to the Psalms onFriday. And now we're finishing
that story. Let me deal withtwo difficulties and then I
want to talk about the maintext here. The main difficulty
is the translation. Verse 29shall be bound in the bundle of
(04:19):
the living. The life of my Lordshall be bound in the bundle of
the living. That's hard totranslate and it's, there's not
a lot of certainty aboutexactly what that means. It
seems to be that God's care forDavid is like when someone puts
their jewelry or their gold anda cloth and rolls it up and
makes it into a bundle. Thefigure there is precious
possessions and she's saying,David's life is precious in the
(04:42):
life , uh, in the eyes of God.
Kinda like how that fits withwhat we talked about yesterday.
The other issue here is inverse 37, when naval dies, his
heart died within him and hebecame a stone. We're not
entirely certain what happenedthere. Maybe he was just
stunned. Maybe it was thebeginning of the end , you
just, did he have a stroke? Didhe have a heart attack? We
can't really tell, but Davidtakes that as God's judgment
(05:05):
upon na ball . And what thatreally helps us see is the
major emphasis in the text.
Abigail's speech is just amasterpiece of wisdom and care.
She averts David from doingsomething truly terrible and
truly wrong, and she does it inthe the very best way. She is
just so wise. Verse 24, shesays, really, it's all my
(05:27):
fault, which of course is nottrue at all. And then verse 25,
she says, Hey, Al is just afool. That's what his name is,
and he acts like his name. Buther major emphasis then begins
in verse 26 where she again andagain will say to David, you
can't take God's place. TheLord is restraining you. Verse
26, from saving with your ownhand. Verse 28, your my Lord is
(05:50):
fighting the battles of theLord. This isn't God's battle,
David, this is personalvengeance. This isn't the kind
of thing that you do. And thenverse 29, he'll take care of
your enemies. He'll sling themout as from the hollow of a
sling. Has Abigail heard aboutwhat David did with a sling to
that Philistine giant? And thenverse 31, she talks about
taking vengeance for himself.
(06:13):
All of this says to David, thisis a mistake. Don't do this. It
will harm you. It'll harm youin the future. When people hear
about, oh, if you cross David,he just takes his whole army
after you and does bad things,it makes David think about Saul
and what Saul is doing. Ithelps David understand he can't
(06:34):
take personal vengeance. And sohe says, verse 33, you've saved
me from avenging myself with myown hand. And then the thing
comes full circle. Like I saidin verse 39, when David says,
blessed be the Lord who hasaveed the insult. I can't do
this. I'm gonna let God takecare of this. What a powerful
(06:54):
lesson and another step in thedevelopment of David's
character as he becomes more ofthe man seeking after God's own
heart. Our reading for Monday,first Samuel 25, 23 to 44. It
is Tuesday. It is Tuesday. Andtoday our reading is First
Samuel 26. The entire chapter,first Samuel chapter 26 is the
reading for Tuesday. There isno zoom tonight West siders
(07:17):
because the elders meet on thefirst Tuesday of the month.
Let's get into First Samuelchapter 26. There's going to be
a little deja vu going on here.
Someone's gonna say, didn't wejust read this? And of course
this chapter is the mirrorimage of chapter 24. But maybe
what that says is we need adouble dose of these lessons
that this business here isimportant enough for the Holy
(07:38):
Spirit to repeat it inscripture for us twice. So
Saul's repentance wears off ifthere was much repentance there
ever. And the next thing youknow, he's chasing after David
again. I do notice in versefour that David has sent out
spies. So David isn't going tobe surprised like he was
before. He's getting smarterand he's getting stronger. So
David and Abishai go down intothe middle of Saul's army.
(08:01):
Think about the kind of couragethat we're talking about here.
This is so impressive. Abishaisays, this is it. We can kill
Saul. Do it. Do it. You cankill Saul. And once again,
David has character talkedabout this last Wednesday
night. You never letcircumstances override what God
has told you to do. And soDavid says, verse 10, as the
(08:22):
Lord lives, the Lord willstrike him. Aha . David learned
from Al , didn't he? Let's letGod take care of these
situations. I don't need to dothat. Abishai, I won't do that.
And then in God's providence,verse 12, there's a deep sleep
from the Lord falling upon thearmy. So God is protecting
David once again. The term fordeep sleep is used in Genesis
(08:45):
chapter two for the deep sleepthat Adam was put under so that
God could take a rib from hisside, which becomes the woman
Eve. So finally it all goesdown again and David starts
shouting and says, listen,verse 19, I'm not bad. I'm not
evil. Verse 18, if it is frommen, maybe be , may they be
(09:06):
cursed before the Lord, but ifit is from the Lord who stirred
you up against me, may heaccept an offering. Now, what
does David mean by that? Ithink what he is saying is if
if , if you're imaginingsomehow you're doing God's
will, then then I need to makean offering and I need to get
right with God. And may theLord accept that and be
compassionate upon me. But theemphasis is on men, that men
(09:29):
are the ones sa that aredriving you to do this. Men are
whispering in your ears andputting all kinds of conspiracy
theories in your ear anddriving paranoia. Don't let
that happen. You Look, I couldhave killed you. I'm not who
they tell you I am. And so Saulknows verse 21, that he has
done wrong. And we get Saul'srepentance here, although
(09:51):
there's no tears and there's nospeaking of David, she
ascension to the throne. Iwonder if Saul is getting a
little more hardhearted.
Probably the emphasis in thetext though is verse 21. I have
acted foolishly I am na ball .
That's what this text is about.
David learned from the Na ballepisode verse 10, Saul is na
(10:17):
ball verse 21. That's what'sgoing on in our reading today.
Our reading for Tuesday. FirstSamuel chapter 26. Welcome to
Wednesday. Welcome toWednesday. And today we read
First Samuel chapter 27. Youwon't like this chapter. I
don't either. It's a messychapter. What I wanna tell you
is that David is on this upwardtrend towards greater
(10:39):
spirituality and seeking God'sheart and that he's just
getting better by the minuteand more faithful and closer to
God, and it's just incredibleand amazing. And then verse one
says, David said in his heart,now I shall perish one day by
the hand of Saul. What happenedto trusting in God? David, what
happened to consulting with Godbefore you do things? Nope .
(10:59):
David doesn't have enough trustand he doesn't have a
consultation with the Lord. Hejust moves to philistia. Now
that will end the Saul threatand it does end the Saul threat
verse four. But it just isgoing to put David in a very
sticky situation. I reallythink what you're looking at
(11:19):
here is a very real lifeaccount of what it was like to
be David. And sometimes we putthese kinds of Bible characters
on a pedestal and we lionizethem. They're incredible. They
never make mistakes, they neverdo anything wrong. And that's
why we're uncomfortable atFirst Samuel chapter 27. But
the truth is life is messy andit's not always an upward trend
towards better and betterspirituality. Sometimes it's
(11:42):
two steps forward and threesteps back . And David is just
fed up with the Saul thing andhe nearly got killed and Saul
is trying to chase him aroundand whatever he seems to do
doesn't seem to make anydifference. And so he decides
he's heading to the Philistinesand he's gonna solve this
problem himself. Now, some havenoted that David was in
Philistia before and nearly gotkilled in chapter 21. So how
(12:05):
does it work better this time?
And I think the answer to thatis that David is there, verse
two with 600 men, and he placeshimself at Ash's service and
they would be glad to have him.
This is quite the army. ThePhilistines would be delighted
for someone to show up with hisown personal army and put that
at their disposal, particularlyif they heard that David was on
the outs with Saul. So Davidnow is living in Ziklag that's
(12:29):
gonna explain how Ziklagbecomes an Israelite city and
David begins to raid and that'san uncomfortable kind of thing.
Is that right for David to dothat? People have tried to
justify this in various kindsof ways, but in short, I think
the answer here is it is notright for David to do this kind
of thing. This isn't Godordered battles and this isn't
against the enemies of Israel.
(12:50):
This is a decision that maycome back to haunt David. Hold
that thought. But when we getto the end of verse 12, the end
of the chapter in verse 12,what we have is David is
playing both sides of thefence. The Philistines thinks
think that he is raiding Judah.
Judah would be pleased thathe's raiding their enemies. And
(13:11):
in any case, it sounds likeDavid is completely loyal to
the Philistines and it seemslike it solved all of the
problems with Saul trying tokill him. And life is good. Is
it? Is it the very first versesof chapter 28 in our reading
tomorrow? Tell us life is notgood. Life is going to be
(13:33):
complicated. See you tomorrowon Wednesday. Our reading is
one Samuel chapter 27. Welcometo Thursday. And today we read
one Samuel chapter 28. And ifyou didn't like yesterday's
reading in one Samuel chapter27, buckle up. This is even
worse. It is much worse. Thisis where Saul hits absolute
rock bottom. This is just asbad as it can possibly be. And
(13:56):
I talked about the first twoverses yesterday that sets up
the problems that David isabout to have. What this is
really about his Saulconsulting the medium of
indoor, she is a medium. She isnot a witch. When I was a kid,
I heard about the witch ofindoor and that made me think
about the woman with the hook,nose and award on the end and
the black pointy hat in acauldron. And that's not what
(14:17):
she is. She's a medium. She isa person who can consult the
dead like a sorcerer. That'swhat she's all about. She is
involved in the occult and it'snot cute and it's not a joke.
This is somebody who'sattempting to access a power
outside of God to appeal tosomething or someone besides
(14:38):
God for help and counsel. Andunderstanding this is
absolutely forbidden by the lawas Saul indicates. He clearly
knows she is doing wrong. Sheis an evil person. And the fact
that Saul goes to her sayseverything you need to know
about where Saul is in hislife, but there is no one else
(14:59):
for Saul to turn to verse six,Saul hasn't been listening to
God, so God isn't talking toSaul. What all of this calls to
mind is that Saul killed all ofGod's priests. And so he
doesn't have anyone to use theephod. For him at least,
certainly no priest would showup for him. He did eliminate
(15:20):
the mediums in the land. Andthat would be a time when Saul
was doing what was right. So hehas no rum or thumb and he
certainly doesn't have Samuel,he doesn't have any prophets.
He has shown that he has no usefor God's word. So God isn't
talking to him. What a, Hey,there's a powerful lesson right
there. There's a powerfullesson right there. If you
(15:41):
aren't interested in what Godhas to say, why would God talk
with you? The lesson from Saulis very powerful here, and we
need to make good applicationof that. So he wants to hear
from Samuel, and maybe thequestion would be, what does
he, what does he want? What ?
What's he asking for here? Andsomeone says, well, he's trying
(16:01):
to find out about the future.
I'm not so sure about that. I'mwondering if he's looking for
God's blessing in the battlethat is to come. Maybe he's
looking for the blessing ofanother God like Baal. Maybe
he's gone that far, but hedoes. Verse 10. Use the Lord's
name to swear that he willbreak God's law. Oh my what? A
complete mess. And then ofcourse the woman says, I , I
(16:25):
can't do this. And they work itout. And she says, okay, I'm
gonna try. And then kabangverse 12, when the woman saw
Samuel, she cried out with aloud voice and said, you are
Saul. Why have you deceived me?
So there's a lot of questionsabout this. Why and how does
Samuel's appearance reveal tothe medium that Saul is the
customer? And the answer tothat is we don't know. There's
not a lot of specifics aboutwhat she did or what she said
(16:47):
or how she conjured, if that'sthe right word, Samuel up maybe
because the Bible doesn't wantus doing that and trying that.
Of course, the bigger questionis, is this really Samuel and
did she really do it? And thatis a controversial question.
And the early church fathersconsistently ruled against it
being real. They said it was ademon or it was a trick. And
lots of people have agreed withthat. I'm gonna say this, I
(17:10):
don't think the Bible iswarning us to stay away from
the occult because it has nopower and it's just
foolishness. I think the Bibletakes exactly the opposite
tack, that the powers ofdarkness are real and we need
to stay away from them. So Iknow of no reason not to read
this at face value. She did it.
It is Samuel and someone'sgonna say, how does she know
(17:32):
it's Samuel? And of courseit's, he's wearing a name tag.
Why is this so hard? So Samuelsays, why then do you ask me
since the Lord has turned fromyou and become your enemy?
Verse 16, that sums up Saul'sreign. He's fighting against
God and God is defeating himevery step of the way. And the
key word in all of that may bein verse is verse 14. I jumped
(17:53):
past that. He's wrapped in arobe. And that certainly makes
us think of the robe that Saulgrabbed when Samuel condemned
him by God's command in oneSamuel 15 and told him the
kingdom had been torn from hishand. He grabs Samuel's robe
and tears it. I wonder if thatrobe here in chapter 28 has a
(18:14):
tear in it, and Samuel uses thedivine name Jehovah or Yahweh
over and over again while Sauljust uses the name God. And you
can see Jehovah or Yahweh inyour Bible, it's rendered as
Lord in small caps. And maybethat says something about
Saul's faith and where he isand how far he is from God. And
(18:36):
so it's just a disaster. Maybea lesson here about learning
the future. Saul gets told thefuture, it's not a happy future
and there isn't anything he cando about it. And so the woman
says, you need to eat Verse 22.
And maybe she's just a goodsouthern woman who solves all
problems with a big meal. I, Idon't know, maybe more than
(18:56):
anything the text is pointing.
I I say that about solvingthings in being a southern
woman would firmly tongue,firmly in cheek there. Maybe
what that really reminds us isthat in the Bible, who you eat
with matters and Saul iswilling to eat with this evil
medium. What a miserable,terrible moment. This is in
(19:17):
King Saul's reign. He reallyhas hit bottom. And again, to
go back to one Samuel 15,Samuel says there this kind of
rebellion why you've disobeyedGod, it it , it's like
divination and sorcery andconsulting medium Saul. That's
what you've done. And now hereat the end of his life, that's
(19:37):
where he is. He's so far fromGod. He actually is consulting
a medium. Saul. Oh , what adisaster. Verse 25, he eats his
last meal, the last meal for aman who cannot be king of
Israel very much longer. Areading for Thursday for Samuel
(19:57):
Chapter 28. Welcome to Friday.
Welcome to Friday. Today we arein the Psalms of course, and we
are reading Psalm 12. The 12Psalm is about talk. It's about
speech. There's two pieces toit, verses one to five is the
evil speech of the wicked. Andthen verses six to eight are
the sure speech of God. This isan individual lament. It is a
(20:19):
cry for help. It is given inthe heading to David. And I
think in many ways the natureof what happens in Psalm 12 is
too general for me to pin itdown to one specific time in
David's life. Yet, because ittalks so much about flattering
lips and the tongue that makesgreat boast, and those who say
we're going to prevail and weare gonna overcome, it's hard
(20:41):
for me not to think about what,what David said to Saul in one
Samuel 26, in verse 19 when hesaid, are men inciting you to
do this? Is that what David'sthinking about when he writes
Psalm 12, evil men and theirevil speech, the things that
they say against him, theyplunder the poor and they, they
just tear people down and doall kinds of terrible sorts of
(21:03):
things. There's flattery anddeceit and boasting and threats
and even rebellion. Our lipsare our own. We do what we
wanna do. Nobody can stop us.
The transition then is in versefive. It's the hinge in the
Psalm. It's the turning pointhere. God arises because as I
mentioned, the poor areplundered and the needy gro , I
(21:26):
will now arise. God says, I'veseen enough of this. I will do
something about it. And incontrast to their terrible
words, the words of the Lord,verse six are pure words, God's
words, pure and absolutelyestablished. And so God says,
I'm going to keep you insafety. And God means what? He
(21:47):
says, the words of the Lord arevaluable because they are so
certain. God always does whathe says every time, all the
time. Verse seven. Now thePsalm doesn't end with they
lived , have happily ever afterverse eight. But instead, there
are problems in this world, butI'm facing them with confidence
because of what God says,because of God's word, because
(22:12):
of God's promises. That's Psalm12. That's our reading for
Friday. Thank you so much forlistening to the podcast this
week. Of course, if it'shelping you, please tell
someone about it and do leaveus a rating or review. So more
people will get an opportunityto see the podcast. They're
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(22:32):
there it is. 'cause lots ofpeople are saying this is
helpful. You can help morepeople find the podcast by
leave a rating or review. Sountil next week when we'll open
our Bibles together again, I'mMark Roberts and I wanna go to
heaven and I want you to cometoo . I'll see you on Monday
with a cup of coffee.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
Thanks for listening to the Westside Church of
Christ Podcast. Monday morningCoffee with Mark. For more
information about Westside, youcan connect with us through our
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(23:16):
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you again with a cup of coffee.
Of course, on next Monday.
Hello, and welcome to the Westside churches
special Monday Morning Coffeepodcast on this podcast, our
preacher Mark Roberts will helpyou get your week started
right. With look back atyesterday's sermon so that we
can think through it furtherand better work the
applications into our dailylives . Mark will then look
(00:28):
forward into this week's Biblereading so that we can know
what to expect and watch for.
And, he may have some extrabonus thoughts from time to
time. So grab a cup of coffeeas we start the week together
on Monday Morning Coffee withMark.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the Monday
Morning Coffee podcast forMonday, March 3rd. I'm Mark,
and of course I've got somecoffee, I've got sermon notes,
I've got my Bible and I'm readyto talk about daily Bible
reading in Samuel. I'mrecovered from a huge couple of
days at West Side , tremendousSunday, great preaching
conference last Thursday andFriday. All kinds of great
(01:14):
things are going on as Godworks through his people at
West Side . It's just a joy tobe a part of that. And part of
that is all of you folks wholisten to this podcast and
encourage me so much soeverything is ready. Get some
coffee. Yep . Let's get ready.
Let's get set. Let's go.
(01:35):
Yesterday I preached a lesson.
I think that's tremendouslyhelpful to people about
remembering who we are based onhow God sees us, what's God's
perspective, what does God seewhen he looks at me? Sometimes
we get very down on ourselves.
We struggle with some of that.
I hope yesterday's lessonhelped you. I wanna build out a
little bit more from that firstpoint. In God's perspective,
(01:56):
I'm a forgiven sinner and saintand I wanna make the
application to how we pray forthe forgiveness of our sins.
Sometimes we'll say thingslike, Lord, we're so weak and
we sin often, or we just sinall the time. We fail all the
time. And and I understand someof that language comes because
we're trying to expresshumility and, and there is a
sense in which we fall farshort of the standard of God's
(02:19):
holiness. I understand aboutthat and you should too. But
when we understand about beinga forgiven sinner, I think that
helps us change our language inour praying. Paul says in
Romans six in verse 11, so youalso must consider yourselves
dead to sin and alive to God inChrist Jesus. Let not sin.
(02:39):
Romans six 12. Therefore reignin your mortal body to make you
obey its passions. Paul doesnot see Christians as
constantly falling into sin,constantly struggling with sin
and being beaten by sin. We'reenslaved to sin. We can't do
any better. We never do anybetter. That's not Paul's
perspective. I don't thinkthat's God's perspective. Yes,
(03:01):
you and I will sin from time totime. You know that. And I know
that we're not happy about it.
It's gonna happen. It doeshappen. But when we are
confessing our sins, what wewant to do is talk about how we
didn't want to do that. We'resorry that we did that. We want
God's help to not do thatanymore. And that we know that
with God's help we can overcomebecause we are forgiven sinners
(03:25):
and saints not held captive insin any longer. Think about
that. I hope that will help youin your praying even today. Now
we're turning our Bibles overto the book of First Samuel.
Let's do some Bible reading. Itis Monday and our reading for
(03:57):
Monday is First Samuel chapter25, verses 23 to 44. This is
the conclusion of the NavalAbigail David story. It was
hard to leave this off onThursday last week so that we
could go to the Psalms onFriday. And now we're finishing
that story. Let me deal withtwo difficulties and then I
want to talk about the maintext here. The main difficulty
is the translation. Verse 29shall be bound in the bundle of
(04:19):
the living. The life of my Lordshall be bound in the bundle of
the living. That's hard totranslate and it's, there's not
a lot of certainty aboutexactly what that means. It
seems to be that God's care forDavid is like when someone puts
their jewelry or their gold anda cloth and rolls it up and
makes it into a bundle. Thefigure there is precious
possessions and she's saying,David's life is precious in the
(04:42):
life , uh, in the eyes of God.
Kinda like how that fits withwhat we talked about yesterday.
The other issue here is inverse 37, when naval dies, his
heart died within him and hebecame a stone. We're not
entirely certain what happenedthere. Maybe he was just
stunned. Maybe it was thebeginning of the end , you
just, did he have a stroke? Didhe have a heart attack? We
can't really tell, but Davidtakes that as God's judgment
(05:05):
upon na ball . And what thatreally helps us see is the
major emphasis in the text.
Abigail's speech is just amasterpiece of wisdom and care.
She averts David from doingsomething truly terrible and
truly wrong, and she does it inthe the very best way. She is
just so wise. Verse 24, shesays, really, it's all my
(05:27):
fault, which of course is nottrue at all. And then verse 25,
she says, Hey, Al is just afool. That's what his name is,
and he acts like his name. Buther major emphasis then begins
in verse 26 where she again andagain will say to David, you
can't take God's place. TheLord is restraining you. Verse
26, from saving with your ownhand. Verse 28, your my Lord is
(05:50):
fighting the battles of theLord. This isn't God's battle,
David, this is personalvengeance. This isn't the kind
of thing that you do. And thenverse 29, he'll take care of
your enemies. He'll sling themout as from the hollow of a
sling. Has Abigail heard aboutwhat David did with a sling to
that Philistine giant? And thenverse 31, she talks about
taking vengeance for himself.
(06:13):
All of this says to David, thisis a mistake. Don't do this. It
will harm you. It'll harm youin the future. When people hear
about, oh, if you cross David,he just takes his whole army
after you and does bad things,it makes David think about Saul
and what Saul is doing. Ithelps David understand he can't
(06:34):
take personal vengeance. And sohe says, verse 33, you've saved
me from avenging myself with myown hand. And then the thing
comes full circle. Like I saidin verse 39, when David says,
blessed be the Lord who hasaveed the insult. I can't do
this. I'm gonna let God takecare of this. What a powerful
(06:54):
lesson and another step in thedevelopment of David's
character as he becomes more ofthe man seeking after God's own
heart. Our reading for Monday,first Samuel 25, 23 to 44. It
is Tuesday. It is Tuesday. Andtoday our reading is First
Samuel 26. The entire chapter,first Samuel chapter 26 is the
reading for Tuesday. There isno zoom tonight West siders
(07:17):
because the elders meet on thefirst Tuesday of the month.
Let's get into First Samuelchapter 26. There's going to be
a little deja vu going on here.
Someone's gonna say, didn't wejust read this? And of course
this chapter is the mirrorimage of chapter 24. But maybe
what that says is we need adouble dose of these lessons
that this business here isimportant enough for the Holy
(07:38):
Spirit to repeat it inscripture for us twice. So
Saul's repentance wears off ifthere was much repentance there
ever. And the next thing youknow, he's chasing after David
again. I do notice in versefour that David has sent out
spies. So David isn't going tobe surprised like he was
before. He's getting smarterand he's getting stronger. So
David and Abishai go down intothe middle of Saul's army.
(08:01):
Think about the kind of couragethat we're talking about here.
This is so impressive. Abishaisays, this is it. We can kill
Saul. Do it. Do it. You cankill Saul. And once again,
David has character talkedabout this last Wednesday
night. You never letcircumstances override what God
has told you to do. And soDavid says, verse 10, as the
(08:22):
Lord lives, the Lord willstrike him. Aha . David learned
from Al , didn't he? Let's letGod take care of these
situations. I don't need to dothat. Abishai, I won't do that.
And then in God's providence,verse 12, there's a deep sleep
from the Lord falling upon thearmy. So God is protecting
David once again. The term fordeep sleep is used in Genesis
(08:45):
chapter two for the deep sleepthat Adam was put under so that
God could take a rib from hisside, which becomes the woman
Eve. So finally it all goesdown again and David starts
shouting and says, listen,verse 19, I'm not bad. I'm not
evil. Verse 18, if it is frommen, maybe be , may they be
(09:06):
cursed before the Lord, but ifit is from the Lord who stirred
you up against me, may heaccept an offering. Now, what
does David mean by that? Ithink what he is saying is if
if , if you're imaginingsomehow you're doing God's
will, then then I need to makean offering and I need to get
right with God. And may theLord accept that and be
compassionate upon me. But theemphasis is on men, that men
(09:29):
are the ones sa that aredriving you to do this. Men are
whispering in your ears andputting all kinds of conspiracy
theories in your ear anddriving paranoia. Don't let
that happen. You Look, I couldhave killed you. I'm not who
they tell you I am. And so Saulknows verse 21, that he has
done wrong. And we get Saul'srepentance here, although
(09:51):
there's no tears and there's nospeaking of David, she
ascension to the throne. Iwonder if Saul is getting a
little more hardhearted.
Probably the emphasis in thetext though is verse 21. I have
acted foolishly I am na ball .
That's what this text is about.
David learned from the Na ballepisode verse 10, Saul is na
(10:17):
ball verse 21. That's what'sgoing on in our reading today.
Our reading for Tuesday. FirstSamuel chapter 26. Welcome to
Wednesday. Welcome toWednesday. And today we read
First Samuel chapter 27. Youwon't like this chapter. I
don't either. It's a messychapter. What I wanna tell you
is that David is on this upwardtrend towards greater
(10:39):
spirituality and seeking God'sheart and that he's just
getting better by the minuteand more faithful and closer to
God, and it's just incredibleand amazing. And then verse one
says, David said in his heart,now I shall perish one day by
the hand of Saul. What happenedto trusting in God? David, what
happened to consulting with Godbefore you do things? Nope .
(10:59):
David doesn't have enough trustand he doesn't have a
consultation with the Lord. Hejust moves to philistia. Now
that will end the Saul threatand it does end the Saul threat
verse four. But it just isgoing to put David in a very
sticky situation. I reallythink what you're looking at
(11:19):
here is a very real lifeaccount of what it was like to
be David. And sometimes we putthese kinds of Bible characters
on a pedestal and we lionizethem. They're incredible. They
never make mistakes, they neverdo anything wrong. And that's
why we're uncomfortable atFirst Samuel chapter 27. But
the truth is life is messy andit's not always an upward trend
towards better and betterspirituality. Sometimes it's
(11:42):
two steps forward and threesteps back . And David is just
fed up with the Saul thing andhe nearly got killed and Saul
is trying to chase him aroundand whatever he seems to do
doesn't seem to make anydifference. And so he decides
he's heading to the Philistinesand he's gonna solve this
problem himself. Now, some havenoted that David was in
Philistia before and nearly gotkilled in chapter 21. So how
(12:05):
does it work better this time?
And I think the answer to thatis that David is there, verse
two with 600 men, and he placeshimself at Ash's service and
they would be glad to have him.
This is quite the army. ThePhilistines would be delighted
for someone to show up with hisown personal army and put that
at their disposal, particularlyif they heard that David was on
the outs with Saul. So Davidnow is living in Ziklag that's
(12:29):
gonna explain how Ziklagbecomes an Israelite city and
David begins to raid and that'san uncomfortable kind of thing.
Is that right for David to dothat? People have tried to
justify this in various kindsof ways, but in short, I think
the answer here is it is notright for David to do this kind
of thing. This isn't Godordered battles and this isn't
against the enemies of Israel.
(12:50):
This is a decision that maycome back to haunt David. Hold
that thought. But when we getto the end of verse 12, the end
of the chapter in verse 12,what we have is David is
playing both sides of thefence. The Philistines thinks
think that he is raiding Judah.
Judah would be pleased thathe's raiding their enemies. And
(13:11):
in any case, it sounds likeDavid is completely loyal to
the Philistines and it seemslike it solved all of the
problems with Saul trying tokill him. And life is good. Is
it? Is it the very first versesof chapter 28 in our reading
tomorrow? Tell us life is notgood. Life is going to be
(13:33):
complicated. See you tomorrowon Wednesday. Our reading is
one Samuel chapter 27. Welcometo Thursday. And today we read
one Samuel chapter 28. And ifyou didn't like yesterday's
reading in one Samuel chapter27, buckle up. This is even
worse. It is much worse. Thisis where Saul hits absolute
rock bottom. This is just asbad as it can possibly be. And
(13:56):
I talked about the first twoverses yesterday that sets up
the problems that David isabout to have. What this is
really about his Saulconsulting the medium of
indoor, she is a medium. She isnot a witch. When I was a kid,
I heard about the witch ofindoor and that made me think
about the woman with the hook,nose and award on the end and
the black pointy hat in acauldron. And that's not what
(14:17):
she is. She's a medium. She isa person who can consult the
dead like a sorcerer. That'swhat she's all about. She is
involved in the occult and it'snot cute and it's not a joke.
This is somebody who'sattempting to access a power
outside of God to appeal tosomething or someone besides
(14:38):
God for help and counsel. Andunderstanding this is
absolutely forbidden by the lawas Saul indicates. He clearly
knows she is doing wrong. Sheis an evil person. And the fact
that Saul goes to her sayseverything you need to know
about where Saul is in hislife, but there is no one else
(14:59):
for Saul to turn to verse six,Saul hasn't been listening to
God, so God isn't talking toSaul. What all of this calls to
mind is that Saul killed all ofGod's priests. And so he
doesn't have anyone to use theephod. For him at least,
certainly no priest would showup for him. He did eliminate
(15:20):
the mediums in the land. Andthat would be a time when Saul
was doing what was right. So hehas no rum or thumb and he
certainly doesn't have Samuel,he doesn't have any prophets.
He has shown that he has no usefor God's word. So God isn't
talking to him. What a, Hey,there's a powerful lesson right
there. There's a powerfullesson right there. If you
(15:41):
aren't interested in what Godhas to say, why would God talk
with you? The lesson from Saulis very powerful here, and we
need to make good applicationof that. So he wants to hear
from Samuel, and maybe thequestion would be, what does
he, what does he want? What ?
What's he asking for here? Andsomeone says, well, he's trying
(16:01):
to find out about the future.
I'm not so sure about that. I'mwondering if he's looking for
God's blessing in the battlethat is to come. Maybe he's
looking for the blessing ofanother God like Baal. Maybe
he's gone that far, but hedoes. Verse 10. Use the Lord's
name to swear that he willbreak God's law. Oh my what? A
complete mess. And then ofcourse the woman says, I , I
(16:25):
can't do this. And they work itout. And she says, okay, I'm
gonna try. And then kabangverse 12, when the woman saw
Samuel, she cried out with aloud voice and said, you are
Saul. Why have you deceived me?
So there's a lot of questionsabout this. Why and how does
Samuel's appearance reveal tothe medium that Saul is the
customer? And the answer tothat is we don't know. There's
not a lot of specifics aboutwhat she did or what she said
(16:47):
or how she conjured, if that'sthe right word, Samuel up maybe
because the Bible doesn't wantus doing that and trying that.
Of course, the bigger questionis, is this really Samuel and
did she really do it? And thatis a controversial question.
And the early church fathersconsistently ruled against it
being real. They said it was ademon or it was a trick. And
lots of people have agreed withthat. I'm gonna say this, I
(17:10):
don't think the Bible iswarning us to stay away from
the occult because it has nopower and it's just
foolishness. I think the Bibletakes exactly the opposite
tack, that the powers ofdarkness are real and we need
to stay away from them. So Iknow of no reason not to read
this at face value. She did it.
It is Samuel and someone'sgonna say, how does she know
(17:32):
it's Samuel? And of courseit's, he's wearing a name tag.
Why is this so hard? So Samuelsays, why then do you ask me
since the Lord has turned fromyou and become your enemy?
Verse 16, that sums up Saul'sreign. He's fighting against
God and God is defeating himevery step of the way. And the
key word in all of that may bein verse is verse 14. I jumped
(17:53):
past that. He's wrapped in arobe. And that certainly makes
us think of the robe that Saulgrabbed when Samuel condemned
him by God's command in oneSamuel 15 and told him the
kingdom had been torn from hishand. He grabs Samuel's robe
and tears it. I wonder if thatrobe here in chapter 28 has a
(18:14):
tear in it, and Samuel uses thedivine name Jehovah or Yahweh
over and over again while Sauljust uses the name God. And you
can see Jehovah or Yahweh inyour Bible, it's rendered as
Lord in small caps. And maybethat says something about
Saul's faith and where he isand how far he is from God. And
(18:36):
so it's just a disaster. Maybea lesson here about learning
the future. Saul gets told thefuture, it's not a happy future
and there isn't anything he cando about it. And so the woman
says, you need to eat Verse 22.
And maybe she's just a goodsouthern woman who solves all
problems with a big meal. I, Idon't know, maybe more than
(18:56):
anything the text is pointing.
I I say that about solvingthings in being a southern
woman would firmly tongue,firmly in cheek there. Maybe
what that really reminds us isthat in the Bible, who you eat
with matters and Saul iswilling to eat with this evil
medium. What a miserable,terrible moment. This is in
(19:17):
King Saul's reign. He reallyhas hit bottom. And again, to
go back to one Samuel 15,Samuel says there this kind of
rebellion why you've disobeyedGod, it it , it's like
divination and sorcery andconsulting medium Saul. That's
what you've done. And now hereat the end of his life, that's
(19:37):
where he is. He's so far fromGod. He actually is consulting
a medium. Saul. Oh , what adisaster. Verse 25, he eats his
last meal, the last meal for aman who cannot be king of
Israel very much longer. Areading for Thursday for Samuel
(19:57):
Chapter 28. Welcome to Friday.
Welcome to Friday. Today we arein the Psalms of course, and we
are reading Psalm 12. The 12Psalm is about talk. It's about
speech. There's two pieces toit, verses one to five is the
evil speech of the wicked. Andthen verses six to eight are
the sure speech of God. This isan individual lament. It is a
(20:19):
cry for help. It is given inthe heading to David. And I
think in many ways the natureof what happens in Psalm 12 is
too general for me to pin itdown to one specific time in
David's life. Yet, because ittalks so much about flattering
lips and the tongue that makesgreat boast, and those who say
we're going to prevail and weare gonna overcome, it's hard
(20:41):
for me not to think about what,what David said to Saul in one
Samuel 26, in verse 19 when hesaid, are men inciting you to
do this? Is that what David'sthinking about when he writes
Psalm 12, evil men and theirevil speech, the things that
they say against him, theyplunder the poor and they, they
just tear people down and doall kinds of terrible sorts of
(21:03):
things. There's flattery anddeceit and boasting and threats
and even rebellion. Our lipsare our own. We do what we
wanna do. Nobody can stop us.
The transition then is in versefive. It's the hinge in the
Psalm. It's the turning pointhere. God arises because as I
mentioned, the poor areplundered and the needy gro , I
(21:26):
will now arise. God says, I'veseen enough of this. I will do
something about it. And incontrast to their terrible
words, the words of the Lord,verse six are pure words, God's
words, pure and absolutelyestablished. And so God says,
I'm going to keep you insafety. And God means what? He
(21:47):
says, the words of the Lord arevaluable because they are so
certain. God always does whathe says every time, all the
time. Verse seven. Now thePsalm doesn't end with they
lived , have happily ever afterverse eight. But instead, there
are problems in this world, butI'm facing them with confidence
because of what God says,because of God's word, because
(22:12):
of God's promises. That's Psalm12. That's our reading for
Friday. Thank you so much forlistening to the podcast this
week. Of course, if it'shelping you, please tell
someone about it and do leaveus a rating or review. So more
people will get an opportunityto see the podcast. They're
scrolling, they're looking intheir podcast app. And bang,
(22:32):
there it is. 'cause lots ofpeople are saying this is
helpful. You can help morepeople find the podcast by
leave a rating or review. Sountil next week when we'll open
our Bibles together again, I'mMark Roberts and I wanna go to
heaven and I want you to cometoo . I'll see you on Monday
with a cup of coffee.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
Thanks for listening to the Westside Church of
Christ Podcast. Monday morningCoffee with Mark. For more
information about Westside, youcan connect with us through our
website, just christians.comand our Facebook page, our
music is from upbeat.io. That'supbeat with two P'S
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U-P-P-B-E-A-T, where creatorscan get free music. Please
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you again with a cup of coffee.
Of course, on next Monday.
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