Saul vs. David



Will I Bring Myself Up to This Level?

gc perfecting holiness in the fear of Godh (2 Corinthians 7:1).

Therefore, having these promises ch I claim God's promises for my life and look to their fulfillment, and rightly so, but that shows only the human perspective on them. God's perspective is that through His promises I will come to recognize His claim of ownership on me. For example, do I realize that my gbody is the temple of the Holy Spirit,h or am I condoning some habit in my body which clearly could not withstand the light of God on it? (1 Corinthians 6:19). God formed His Son in me through sanctification, setting me apart from sin and making me holy in His sight (see Galatians 4:19). But I must begin to transform my natural life into spiritual life by obedience to Him. God instructs us even in the smallest details of life. And when He brings you conviction of sin, do not gconfer with flesh and blood,h but cleanse yourself from it at once (Galatians 1:16). Keep yourself cleansed in your daily walk.

I must cleanse myself from all filthiness in my flesh and my spirit until both are in harmony with the nature of God. Is the mind of my spirit in perfect agreement with the life of the Son of God in me, or am I mentally rebellious and defiant? Am I allowing the mind of Christ to be formed in me? (see Philippians 2:5). Christ never spoke of His right to Himself, but always maintained an inner vigilance to submit His spirit continually to His Father. I also have the responsibility to keep my spirit in agreement with His Spirit. And when I do, Jesus gradually lifts me up to the level where He lived\a level of perfect submission to His Father's will\where I pay no attention to anything else. Am I perfecting this kind of holiness in the fear of God? Is God having His way with me, and are people beginning to see God in my life more and more?

Be serious in your commitment to God and gladly leave everything else alone. Literally put God first in your life.

Where is the joy? Where is the freedom? Where is the blessing? Where is the peace? Where is the Glory?

 Have you ever asked these about your spiritual walk, about your life as a Christian, about your church, about this church?

 How many years have we lived in anxiety and fear and not in the security, the life and freedom that come from assured salvation?

How many years has the church (yes, that means you and I) lived under the law and not the love.

How many years have we felt the heaviness of lifes yoke? Where is the yoke that Christ promised?

 How many years has Saul been King and not David?

 Are you satisfied with your walk? Are you satisfied with your life? Are you satisfied with the droplets of blessing when the bible offers to open the floodgates of heaven? Are you satisfied with mere glimpses of God in the distance when God has promised his presence?

 No, No, No, No, No

 If any of these concerns are concerns of yours then the words of  1 Chronicles 13:3 should ring in your ears. Should pound at the door of your heart

 We did not use it to ask God for help while Saul was King

 Well my friend, my brothers and sisters today we come not to praise Saul but to bury him!!!!

 Today is the day when we begin to use the Glory to ask for God to help use.

That is the Glory. The Glory, the kabod, is the weighty presence of God. It is God with us, It is Emmanuel. It is the Spirit of God, the same spirit that is God, Jesus was the arc of Glory, He was the temple and now that temple is us.

 1 Corinthians 6:19

 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are Godfs

 The question I guess for us is: Is the Gory present in our lives? Are our bodies temples of the Holy Spirit? Do we carry it with us our just leave it at the church on Sunday. We are more like the tabernacle of Moses then the temple of Solomon as we carry the temple with us. It is completely portable going everywhere we go because it is us. Or are we like the empty temple with veil in place continuing all the ritual and ceremonies as if the glory was there but the room is empty. Are we as temple as the temple was when the ark was lost.  Some times I think so. This is the emptiness many of us felt that lead us back to God, that lead us to Jesus but we forgot to give it a permanent home within ourselves.

 Jesus told us to ask for anything in his name. But so many of us are living out the Kingdom as if we were Saul and so many of our lives shadow Saul and many of our churches shadow His kingdom.  The Kingdom of the world and not the kingdom of God.

 What Kind of man of man was Saul

Proud, Angry, jealous, insecure, vengeful, unforgiving, a man of immediate need, dark, gloomy, image conscious, driven by the perceptions of others

All these things are brought on by fear

 Let us remind ourselves of the story

For many years the Israelites had no King. God alone was the only king of Israel Instead whenever Israel was in trouble or went off course God would raise up a judge to lead them protect them and set them straight. But the Israelites were tired of this they wanted something more permanent and less as you can guess, judging. They looked around them and wanted to be like all the other kingdoms. They wanted a standing army they wanted to see and feel physical safe. They were willing to essentially dethrone the greatest most powerful and loving king for a cheap facsimile. Oh Israel had you not learned anything why are you still building up idol and false images. Well they persisted and persisted Samuel brought all their pleadings to God. And even when they were told of the cost they would pay.

1 Samuel 8:6-22

But when they said, "Give us a king to lead us," this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the LORD. And the LORD told him: "Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king. As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you.  Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will do."  Samuel told all the words of the LORD to the people who were asking him for a king.  He said, "This is what the king who will reign over you will do: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots. Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. Your menservants and maidservants and the best of your cattle and donkeys he will take for his own use. He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves. When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, and the LORD will not answer you in that day."

But the people refused to listen to Samuel. "No!" they said. "We want a king over us.  Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles." When Samuel heard all that the people said, he repeated it before the LORD.  The LORD answered, "Listen to them and give them a king." Then Samuel said to the men of Israel, "Everyone go back to his town."

 You will be taxed, repressed your lives will be made into a drudgery.

 You can almost see God throwing up his had in frustration and saying WellAif your gonna keep whining then Ifll give you what you want. Have a king. And then he just sits back and watches as things are bound to go downhill.

So Samuel went out and began the search. Finally he found Saul a tall handsome fellow that the people would surely like, and he seemed humble. So God gave of reluctant okay and Saul was anointed as King and at first he was a good King leading the people and humble at the same time. But Saul had a fatal flaw, insecurity, fear. And as he started to feel like king he started to believe he was king and He started to forget who the real king was. He started to make the kingdom his.

He forgot as Daniel 2: 20 to 22 says

"Praise be to the name of God for ever and ever; wisdom and power are his.  He changes times and seasons; he sets up kings and deposes them. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the discerning. He reveals deep and hidden things; he knows what lies in darkness, and light dwells with him.

He started top forget about God and he started doing things his way. Saul only turned to God or used the ark when things were not working his way. His way came first and if that didnft work he could always fall back on God

Well all was going well until Goliath came along and then Saulfs fear was in the open for all to see. There was no man in Israel that could defeat this giant. And he didnft know what to do. Along comes a little sheppard boy called David who knows that no man could defeat goliath but God could. He remembered what Israel and Saul had forgotten that God would always be their true king and protector.

After Goliath fell you would think Saul would be please but no his fear now turned into the form of jealousy burned all the stronger.

They say that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely

With power comes the potential of great fear When you stand on the peak you forget to look up and you only see where you may fall. Many who obtain power or a position of leadership change and this is what happened to Saul when he stopped looking up he felt the fear of losing the power. In the world this is a driving force behind so many executives, politicians, supposed world leaders, companies and so also the driving force behind what goes wrong

In a similar manner when we take to much control over our lives and our churches when we put man/ or woman at the top and forget that God is the true King. When they are run buy our wills and committees instead of God then things go wrong fear creeps in the system is corrupted we corrupt our churches we corrupt our lives because we look do not look to the true king. We lose the servants heart and we are given over to fear we fear losing control. We fear giving everything over to God. Do we not do the same thing in our lives and churches.

And in the end Saul lost it all and fell on his own sword. A life that was driven by fear and jealousy ended the way it was lived It is a metaphor that is sad. He destroyed Himself, He killed Himself

1 Samuel 31:4

Saul said to his armor-bearer, "Draw your sword and run me through, or these uncircumcised fellows will come and run me through and abuse me." But his armor-bearer was terrified and would not do it; so Saul took his own sword and fell on it.

 What kind of King was David

Well Ifll tell you right from the get go he wasnft perfect and I will say that in fact he wasnft a good king. And when he acted like a king he became no better than Saul himself. So David was not special. But he became special when he became nothing when he became a servant king serving the true King of Israel, calling of God for help and comfort. Being fully and totally emotionally in contact with God. He didnft just pray standard prayers He didnft just sing standard song but he fully opened up all his emotions with his Great King. And he turned to God when he felt distressed and he turned to God in joy and he turned to God when he was lonely. He pleaded he asked he relied of the staff of God his true comforter

 The question each of us must ask ourselves this morning is

Who do I identify with in this story, Saul or David?

 We too have a choice

We can set ourselves up as kings and queens of our own lives or we can allow God to be the ruler. We can try to do it our way and ultimately fail and be driven into a place of fear, jealousy, bitterness, depression, a place where we may even want to fall on our own swords or we can ask for Gods help. Ask that his presence be known in our lives ask that he takes control

 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are Godfs

 Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete.

We did not use it to ask God for help while Saul was King

Who do I identify with, Saul or David?

Let us stop playing king or queen in our own lives setting up false kingdom bound for failures. Let us ask upon God to be king of of lives king of our churches and find joy complete.

Let us pray

 Is there any hope for present-day Sauls? Must those who shut out God, and shut out the feelings of others, controlling, manipulating and destroying them in the process, must they all go "die or go mad"? In the history of Christianity, perhaps no one was more awestruck in reading this story than that brilliant Jew, Saul of Tarsus. He, too, was from the tribe of Benjamin. Though he was not a head taller in stature, he was so in theological training, far surpassing his countryman in learning and zeal. Then one day he came in contact with the new David. This One had slain Goliath on a cross, and he, too, like David of old, was stealing all of Israel's heart. Saul of Tarsus burned with rage and zeal. Determined to stamp out the movement, and given legal authorization to do so, he, too, threw a spear. Unlike the Saul of old, however, his spear found its mark in one follower of Christ named Stephen.

But in the end, the LORD was with the little band of disciples. Saul's manipulative actions only furthered their cause. His persecution of them forced them to disperse, and as they did they spread The Story even further (Acts 8:4). Saul's rage intensified, almost consuming him, and he headed off to Damascus carrying the death warrants of all who loved the Savior. Then on the Damascus Road, a voice came from heaven saying, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?" -- echoing David's words to Saul in 1 Samuel 26:18. Saul was blinded and broken. That day he was changed from the enemy of God to the friend of God, from the persecutor of the church to the great apostle who gave his life for the church.

Can God revive the emotions of controlling personalities who have destroyed their own lives and the lives of others? What emotions do you think Saul of Tarsus felt as he re-read the ancient story of Saul and saw it re-enacted in his own life and, instead of his going mad and dying, both Christ and Stephen died for him? Do you think Paul had emotions? Could he love like a Jonathan? Read his letters: "The love of Christ constrains me...whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as a loss for the sake of Christ." Could Paul sing with joy like the women of Israel? He sang in a Philippian jail for the love of Christ.." What changed him? It was nothing less than God's all-pursuing love for sinners.

     Amazing love! how can it be,

    That Thou, my God shouldst die for me?

 The question each of us must ask ourselves this morning is

Who do I identify with in this story, Saul or David?

 Oh Saul, where are you today? May you see Christ and be converted from the heart.