God's primary concern is the internal transformation of believers until Christ is formed within them, not outward results or human service. Faithfulness, characterized by right motives, is what God truly seeks, not human success or judgment. The sermon contrasts this with the human tendency to judge others, asserting that only the Lord can judge motives and intentions. Ultimately, a heart devoted to God is called for, illustrated by the story of Jonathan and David, where true love leads to a complete surrender of one's position, conduct, skills, and resources to Christ.
Restored with Diffio
Audio restored with Diffio. Diffio processed the original archive recording to reduce noise and produce a cleaner listening version; the original stays available.
Speech quality score (model-estimated, SCOREQ): before 1.66 → restored 4.49
I want to turn to First Corinthians chapter four this morning. First Corinthians four, we're all quite familiar, I think, with the third chapter, but chapter divisions sometimes hinder us because we get to the end of chapter three, we quit. And the subject didn't stop there at all. It was a letter. Now, sometimes people who love each other very much write letters that are almost like books, but I remember seeing anybody else dividing them into chapters.
But because they were convenient, say. Our Bible has been divided into chapters, although I can tell you I'm going to read it first Corinthians chapter four. I can't tell you what page it is, because our Bibles are not all printed like, but we do need chapter divisions. But you make a very great mistake if you're guided by chapter divisions in your study. You want to go right along and see what follows, and the judgment seat of Christ. taught to us in the third chapter of First Corinthians, I believe, was carried right over into the fourth chapter, and we missed the main point of the whole issue if we missed what he had in the same chapter four.
In chapter three, he's talking about how the judgment will be conducted as a result of that judgment. But in chapter four, he tells us the basis of that judgment. He tells us what God is really looking for. Now, you certainly don't think that God is looking for gold, silver, and precious gold. And you certainly don't think that God is looking for results. He wanted results, brother. He wouldn't get you to do it. He'd get an angel to do it. Remember the time you wanted that Syrian army destroyed? You sent one angel down, and then one night you destroyed a hundred, maybe ten thousand people on it?
If he really wanted something done efficiently, he wouldn't bother with us. Your service is not the valuable thing. God is not the much concerned with what he can do through you, as he is, what he can do in you. He's wanting to produce his own son's life within you. Remember what Paul said in the Galatians, my little children of whom I travail again. in birth until Christ be formed in you, not until you get to the efficient servants and wonderful soul leaders and so on, but until Christ be formed in you. God is looking for fruit.
The fruit of the Spirit is not sold. It is not sold. I know they say that on the radio. I've heard many others say it. If you didn't win any souls for the Lord Jesus this week, you didn't bear any fruit. That's ridiculous. I believe in soul wake if it's part of God's plan for you. And he can use you today in there or here or sitting here. That's his responsibility. He'll tell you where he wants you to be, that your responsibility is to be so devoted to himself that whatever he chooses will please you. That's my responsibility. And that's what it takes on First Corinthians four, right motive.
He says, let a man so account of us. as of the ministries of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover, it is required in stewards that a man be found faithful, not successful, faithful. Faithfulness is something that's on the inside. A man is faithful to his employer if his motives toward his employer is right. A man is faithful to his wife of his motives within him toward his wife are right. And a steward is faithful to God if his motives are right. It's required that a man be found faithful.
What would mean is the very small thing that I should be judged of you or a man's judgment? He said, I judge not by no himself. That is, I don't pass final judgment on myself. Of course, he judged himself for things that were not right. But he said, I don't pass the final judgment. I don't say, well, I've arrived. I'm what I ought to be. I don't judge my own self, for I know nothing by myself. A revised version says, I know nothing against myself. Paul tried to keep a clear conscience. He did that before he was saved. And after he was saved, he was more particular than ever, to keep a clear conscience. He tried to be careful if there was nothing against it.
And he said, so far as I know, there's nothing against me. Yet am I not hereby justified, but he that judges me is the Lord. Therefore, judge nothing before the time. I think one of the most awful things that goes on among God's dear people is the setting on judgment on each other. And I've had to confess it myself a good many times. If you haven't had, you haven't confessed it to yourself because you know you've been guilty of it. It's the exception rather than the rule to find a Christian who doesn't criticize his fellow Christians. We sit in judgment on each other.
We're so particular about something. We say, oh, we wouldn't think of having any world in this in our lives. We wouldn't do this, we wouldn't do that. And yet we'll put each other on the resetting table and just take them apart and do it with enjoyment. You know what happens. I visited a place, I won't tell you where, probably some of you know the folks. I visited a place which prided themselves upon their strictness. I tell you, they were exactly right about everything. I know I'm being facetious.
I want you to get what I'm saying. These people were pleased with themselves. They were separated people, so they said. They had nothing to do with people in the denominations and not even a lot of the rest of us. I thought the Apostle Paul himself would have had a hard time getting in there. They were correct, but I spent the day when one of the leading men In that particular assembly, all I heard all afternoon was a mixture of covetous discussions about new things that they could get and taking the people of God apart.
It's a shameful thing. We ought to get on our faces before God and confess that it was a talking about our fellow Christians. If there are things that need to be discussed that are wrong, principles that are wrong, let's discuss the principles, but let's remember that even though God's children may be involved in that, we owe it to them, and we owe it to the Lord not to pass final judgment on our bread. I can tell if a thing is wrong, but I can't tell why you did it. Yes, you hear Christians say every day, Well, I know.
He says don't know. And I know what he means. You don't know anything of the kind. Well, she does a lot of nice things, but I know why she does it. Meaning, and you don't know. You don't know. You couldn't know. And I don't know. But God does know. What can I do there? I can't pass by them, judging them even on myself. Therefore I have no right to judge your motives. Therefore judge nothing before the time until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness and will make manifest the counsel of the harm."
That's the motive. The roots, the causes, The reason he'll make it manifest. And you thought that that man was doing what he was doing to show off, because he had a kind of a cocky little air about him, which he inherited from his grandpa, and he couldn't help it. But you thought that he was doing what he was doing because he liked to show off. And if a judgment seat of Christ, the Lord will show that that man did it because he loved the Lord Jesus. won't you be ashamed that you were critical of them?
Well, he'll make manifest the counsel of the heart. Now, what will happen? And then shall every man have praise of God. I think that's one of the most encouraging verses of the Bible. Haven't you wondered sometimes if there would be any praise at the just and see of Christ for you? Well, there will be. God will find something. He'll find something. If you're really a child of God, you'll find something. What do you find? He'll find some love for him. For we love him.
That is a true motive. Did you ever notice within James one and twelve, he said that he is going to give as a reward for those who love Him, exactly the same crown that He promises in the second chapter of Revelation that He will give to the martyrs. He put that over. He promises exactly the same crown for devoted faithfulness to the Lord because we love Him, that He promises to the martyrs who lay down in their life for Christ. Personally, I think it's a lot harder to live for the Lord than it is to die for.
Amen. And it sure takes a lot of long. Because I've got many of the Lord's people who have been faithful. under dead, and they'll get a crown of life. There have been a good many who have been faithful all their lives. James one and twelve says, they'll get a crown of life. Why? Because the throne he was the same in both cases. The man died for Jesus because he loved him, and the man who lived for Jesus because he loved him. Maybe he wasn't very smart. Sometimes I'd like to trade all intelligence that we have, spiritual intelligence too, for just a little love and devotion to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, this matter of motives always causes me to think of the negative side of it. I find that the New Testament is pretty well balanced between the two. You can't just have all positive teaching. You've got to have a balance with these things. You've got to know that this is this and that is not. And that's the way the Word of God is laying up. He tells you certain things are right, he tells you certain things are wrong. He tells you you should do certain things, and he tells you you should not do certain things. And you have wrong motives presented in the New Testament. One of them is the praise of man.
In the twelve chapters, John, you remember, it says that they love the praise of me, more than the praise of God. So, wholeheart, keep waiting there. You're working in a tight little group of folks, just a little group of folks in your assembly. You all know each other. And you're all very intense about this thing. You want to be what you ought to be. So you think, well, I'd better do that because, you know, for this old soul thing. Or I'll have to go to the meeting. I don't have the least ambition to go.
Far out of the way at home. But I'll have to go because if I don't go, they'll think I'm actually. I wouldn't want to find out. So I'll go. And the Lord didn't get a thing out of it. I don't say he shouldn't go. It's a lot better to go for that reason than not at all, but that's a poor reason to go. That's a wrong reason to go. Do you do things to please me, or do you do things to fear me, because of fear of man? In the twenty-nine chapters of the book of Proverbs, he tells us the fear of man bringing this name. If we're afraid, of what our brethren and sisters will say and do.
Or, for that matter, afraid of what God would do. That's legality. I told you one day here that a man said to me, he'd be afraid not to do certain things that he knew he ought to do, because he'd be afraid what God would do to his children. to think that I've got to do certain things because I'm afraid God will crack the whip. That's like a wife saying, I'd be afraid not to get up and get my husband to breakfast. She'd divorce me. I guess there are that kind of men.
But if my wife ever knows anything for that reason, I don't know if I don't find it out. So far, I'm conceited enough to think that she does it because she loves me. And I'm far more pleased with that than I would be because she did it out of fear. Necessity. Remember what he said in the Second Corinthians, chapter nine? I think it's the seventh verse. He tells us that we're to give, not of necessity, and not grudgingly. the willingness, for God love of the cheerful given.
That word cheerful is pretty strong word they tell me. It means hilarious. Just pick on it down for a chance. Well, you know, if brother's home goes here and we don't give him something, pay it straight. Very likely he'll be here all fall. It's a necessity. A necessity. Well, after all, the poor woman does have all those kids and she's got to feed them. Well, I suppose there's nothing else to do. Keep it.
Keep it. You'll never see that the judgment seat of Christ. Father, if on the other hand that heart of yours can be opened so you say, I love my blessed Lord. The best that I can do is too little. All I can give is too little. And your heart's right. Your gift will be right. You know, love is the very heart of Christianity, because God is about it. Everything God did for you, He did it because He loves you. He wasn't obligated in this life.
He could have sent us all to hell and been doing perfect and right, couldn't He? Well, all right, He did it then because He loved us. Nobody told He could do it. The Lord Jesus gave himself for us because he loved us. I know it was love to the Father and there are many high motives that we mustn't forget, but as far as I'm personally concerned, I can say the Son of God loved me and gave himself for me. I wasn't so irresistible. He loved me because he finally couldn't have himself. He loved me because that was his nature. And now, he says in Romans chapter five, the love of God is poured into our heart.
That's the little orange there. Cheddar broad in our heart. The love of God is poured into our heart by His Holy Spirit. When we have given them blood. I know some of us have gotten this. Hearts twisted up so tight and got the mouth of the clothes so that he can't pour in much of the love of God. We're so busy, we don't read his word, we don't spend time in his presence, and so we're kind of shriveled up and dried up, and therefore there isn't much in the well springs of our heart that wells up toward him, in love to him, and then in love to others.
That verse in First John reads in our King James Version, We love him because he first loved us. I was shocked to find that in most of the critical texts, leaves out the word him. We love because he first loved us. And I thought, now that's too bad. That leaves us. Well, then I thought, of course it doesn't leave him out. It just includes a few others with him. That's all. We love because he first loved us. Who would I love naturally first and most? Well, I'd love him. But it doesn't stop there. The proof of your love to the Lord Jesus is that your love to all his own.
We know that we attack from death and to life. Why? Because we love the bread. And this God has put in us. I don't sit around and... try to poke this up. A lot of poor unsaved people have tried so hard to love God, and when they made it up, acknowledging, well, I just don't love him, and there isn't any use for me to try. And then they found out they were lost. And then they were born again, and then they found the new love came in. God put it there. Now that's what he wants to foster. Remember what I tried to show you last night? But there was absolutely nothing in us that God can use except what God puts in.
Old John Walton was so worthless and useless to God that he just put him on the cross. Our old man is crucified with Christ. That's all he could do. But then he put a new life within him, and that new motive is what God is going to reward. Now, I want to turn you to an Old Testament picture of this in First Samuel, chapter eighteen. First Samuel, chapter eighteen. Seventy chapter of First Samuel is the story of David and Goliath.
Favorite story with all boys and girls. All would be more of a favorite with those of us who are leaning on faith. Because it's a beautiful picture of the Lord Jesus himself. Winning the victory over Satan. sending us free, when we were completely bound and helpless. More than that is a picture of substitution. Who do you think should have gone out and fight that down? Why so, of course. One who had the shoulders above all those people?
A great big fellow, seven beehive, with all that wonderful armor that he had. I shouldn't have been out there. He's the champion of Israel, isn't he? That's why they chose the king. But he was a flat favorite. Well, he was a king, after all, you don't expect a king to go, well, all right, then he should have gone for the king. Jonathan, his son. I don't know if he took anything after he's poor or not, but if he did, he must have been pretty good Walker himself. I wouldn't be surprised if Jonathan was a pretty good man. And he's no kid either by this time. Jonathan is past middle-aged by the time that this story takes place.
He's been trained in the arts of the war all his life. And, of course, he's well upset as he did because he's the son of Saul, the king. What's the matter with Jonathan that he stands trembling in his tent like a woman would be out there fighting that giant? Well, a giant's too much for it. He might be seven feet tall, but the giant is pretty near the ten feet tall. He might know how to handle a sword, but that giant has got a spear like a weaver's beak. And he can't stand back and shoot at him, because he's got a shield that is like a barn door, and there's no use at all to try to get out the man. He's on the nose. And so he stays at his tent and trembles.
And then he sees this stripling of a boy. Now, David couldn't have been over twenty years old, and he might not have been more than seventeen when this happened. He's just a boy. And this boy, in the might of the Lord, he's learned God's back out there taking care of sheep. In the might of the Lord, he fights that job. Now Saul asked about him at the close of chapter seventeen. When Saul, verse fifty-five, said when Saul saw David go forth against the Philistine, he said to Abner, the captain of the host, Abner, whose son is this you?
And Abner said, as I so love it, live a little king, I cannot tell. Now they both should have known him, for before this David had plagued the heart for the king. But this selfish king didn't recognize him. I don't think Jonathan knew him either until this time. Well, anyway, they inquired who he is. And in verse fifty-eight, they brought him before Saul, Saul said to him, Who son or thou, thou young man? And David answered, I am the son of my servant Jesse, the Bethlehemite. And the king was mad when he had made an end of speaking unto Saul.
that the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul. Here's one of the strangest love stories in all the Bible. We always think of a love story involving a man and a woman. And we always think there's something kind of peculiar about two men loving each other. But here this man, Jonathan, who is past middle-aged, maybe as much as fifteen, sixty years of age, and this boy, who is not more than twenty, are attracted to each other.
Why? Well, it's their background. Of course, they hadn't. Oh, they didn't have the same interest. They didn't have the same background at all. Jonathan is born and bred to the throne. He's the man who's been trained in the arts of war. He's the man who has been before the public. He's about to become the king in the place of his father, so he thinks. And here's this boy, David, who's growing up in the back woods, taking care of a few sheep in the wilderness. What is it that draws Jonathan to David? I'll tell you what it is. He saw David take his place. and he heard David speak.
And that's what drew us to our day. Isn't it? Remember the time that you first heard him speak? Neither heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me have everlasting life. Oh, you didn't hear an audible voice, but you heard his voice through the word. You saw what he had done for you, and you said, as Jonathan must have said, he took my place. He won that victory for me, and I love him for it. And his soul was mixed to the same thing. Now, if you don't know what I'm talking about this far, I am nothing more than hatred.
There may be some here who are not getting there. Remember, you're only thinking of the Lord Jesus as a kind of a fire escape. Maybe your only thing, I mean, in an abstract kind of way, well, he died on the cross for our sins, yeah, but is your soul it to him? Does your heart go out to him? Did you ever kneel before him and tell him that you thank him because he loved you and died for you on the cross? Do you know what I'm talking about? Well, now that's what the Lord wants more than anything else.
He wants our heart's devotion to himself. He wants us to see that everything we have is wrapped up in our daily. And God wants the motive of your heart, which he put in there. He wants your love. He wants it more than anything else. I went home after being out preaching quite a while in time. We had been married too long, and my wife was very anxious to please. And being of a French background, she had good training, the French women weighed on their husbands, a great deal, and I have my head screwed on straight when I married that kind of woman.
I do appreciate the attention she's always given me. and the way she's tried to do for me, but she said, oh, I've been gone for a long time on that trip. When I was lonely for her company, and I came home and just dropped my suitcase in the living room and sat down beside her and what we said to each other, it's none of your business, but pretty soon she jumped up and she said, oh, I'm going to get dinner started. I watched her leave and sat there a little bit and followed her out in the kitchen. And she, you know, was busy. And I said, let's go sit down for a while.
She said, I've got to get to dinner and ask her, listen, I can hire somebody to cook dinner and be brought and eat in a restaurant. I came home to see you. Amen. I want her company. I want it now, too. And I'm glad I'm headed in that direction when I get through here. Amen. We've been married for thirty years, but she's still crazy about it. I won't tell anybody about it. It's a wonderful thing to be married to one you love. Amen. That's God's order. But listen, it's just as wonderful and far more so to be devoted to the Lord Jesus, to love Him.
Do you? I know what to say. He said, well, I can't talk about my love. It's his love for me. Well, he talks about your love. He talks a lot about it. He says that's what he's going to reward. It's the judgment seat of Christ. He says that's the only motive for anything that we do for him. Our hearts have got to be devoted to him. How much have you done it because you felt you had to do it? How much have you done because you had some other motive? That's how he wouldn't have done it, even though it was perfectly right. It was for a wrong move. I believed it. It's all my heart. I believe that we, like Jonathan, have got to be devoted to our behavior.
What do you say you can't just carry it though? No, that's right. Something follows this. Saul took him that day and would not lay and would let him go no more home to his father's house. Then Jonathan and David made a covenant. because he loved him as his own soul. Have you ever thought much of the Lord's expression when he instituted the Lord's Supper, when he said, This is the new covenant in my blood? Have you ever thought much of that? Now, we think as Christians that the covenant related to Israel And they say there is a coming day when the new covenant will be ratified with Israel.
And that's given to us in Hebrews chapter ten. But we say, covenants are agreements between Israel and God, or some post-Free Israelite days. But don't you see, there is a sense in which all people who love each other come together. There is an agreement between people who love each other. There is a covenant of marriage for a man and a woman who love each other. There are all kinds of covenants, many of which are intended for this purpose.
You received the Lord Jesus for your Savior. You made no promises. There was no reason why you should. You obey them in baptism. Now baptism is not a sacrament. The Lord suffers not a sacrament. The word sacrament means the soldier's oath. The soldier pledges his allegiance to his king or to his government. That is what baptism is. That is what the Lord suffers. But there ought to be, in the experience of every Christian, a covenant relationship in which we join hands with him, say, Lord, I love thee and I give myself to thee.
And we meet. That ought to be reiterated often. I think the fine custom on the twenty-fifth wedding anniversaries, or fiftyth wedding anniversaries, or... Anytime like that, to have a repetition of the Marian ceremony. I've seen it done a few times. I think it's a real nice thing. In fact, it matter, I think it would be a nice thing if we did it every year. And in heart and in spirit, I think people who love each other do reiterate their covenant with each other, and they do it often. Every time a man tells his wife, I'm glad I married you, he is reiterating his marriage covenant.
There was a time when he said before the witnesses, I do. I think this woman. I want this woman to be my wife. And it's good for married people to often say it to each other. I'm interested in what I still mean. And it's a good thing for us. reiterate this in the presence of the Lord but the sad part of it is I believe with all my heart that there are Christians who have never once said it Lord I belong to thee I surrender myself without reservation to thee have never said it once yet they'll hear it ten percent the other ninety percent there One man actually told me, he said, well, I try to give the Lord his share.
Sometimes I give him more in the share. I'm always after my interfaith. Amen. And yet he's a leading brother. I don't know where he's leading to, but that's what he is. Yes, I'll give the Lord Sunday, Sunday morning anyway. I want Sunday afternoon to read the papers, sell it myself the food, and sit around in the parlor and look at the television. But I'll give him Sunday morning. After all, that's pretty good. But Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday belong to my business. And of course Saturday is my recreation day. If that's what you give the Lord, you might as well keep it.
Amen. All the days are his. All your possessions are his. Save me know something about what I'm talking about. Look at the next verse. And Jonathan stripped himself. This is one of the most undignified stories in all the Bible. I want you to try to picture. A fancify's imagination will help people to grasp the things that the Lord has for us. I want you to think about this shepherd boy that's just come in off the farm. This tripling of a boy with a ruddy face and no beard yet, he's standing there, he's just won a victory.
And here is Jonathan, the great big hope of a fellow, his father's pride son, who is the intended heir of the throne. He's dressed in the royal robe of the crown prince. And he looked at this boy and he says, here, I don't deserve this, and he takes off this lonely robe and he lays it down at the feet of this shepherd boy. You see, now that's going too far. After all, he could have bought him a suit. That has been enough. Yes, there are too many people who are reaching for checkbooks. when there are hard in the minutes. Amen. I like to see a man I haven't seen for many years, and I tried to help him when he was a poor man.
I spent a lot of time with him. He was out of touch with the Lord and he was in desperate condition. And I spent a lot of time with him back during the Depression days, and I drove miles out of my road to stop the seed, to try to help him to get back to the Lord. He got to be a big man financially. And I think he got back to the Lord in a measure. At least he got his life straightened out. I went to see him and he says, well, oh, glad to see him. He sure came. He started reaching and he hit pocket. He said, I'm awfully busy right now, but I want to, I said, put that thing back in your pocket.
I said, huh? I didn't come in here to see the inside of your pocketbook. I don't need anything. Put it back in your pocket. I came in to see you, and if you're so busy that you're having time to visit with me, Acha-maximo at the time. I said, put your tears, and I'm saying it to you. And I walked out. He got hurt because any feelings hurt. Which is exactly what I wanted me to do. I want to shock you into the sensibility, realize that you can't buy friendship with a checkbook. Amen. There are too many people reaching for a checkbook. And Jonathan Curtis said, this role belongs to me. This role represents my position. This role represents my importance.
I'll buy the boy a suit so he'll fit in the face. But he didn't. And the Lord would like to have your checkbook. But he'd far rather have yourself. He took off his role. Now, his role stands for his position in life. What's your position? All of it has come. May not be important in the eyes of the world, but it might be very important to the Lord. You have some position in your community. You have some position in your neighborhood.
You have some position in your business. What is your position? Did you ever live at the feet of the Lord Jesus? Did you ever say, Lord Jesus? Whatever I am, whatever place that I hold here in this world is yours. After all, I attained to this position by hard work, and this is by means of making a way for myself. I can't turn that all over to the Lord. Anyway, if I say, Lord, here I am, in total, completely yours, you tell him I take my position away from it.
Do you think for a minute? that David greedily grabbed up that robe and started putting it on? I wrote. I'm sure that when this was all over, David said, now Jonathan, thank you so much. But this is not my robe after all. You put it back on and remember that you're wearing it for days. You know what the Lord says to us, when you give your position in life to him, Isn't that what he said? Now, you can go ahead and wear that position to me. Some people think that if they give themselves to the Lord, that he'll send them to the mission people.
I don't think that at all. Some think that they give themselves to the Lord, he'll send them out what they call full-time service for the Lord. I don't know what that is. Obviously, they are tonight themselves. They call it a full-time service. They just don't count that eight hours a day. The rest of the time it goes with it. where it is, that isn't what the Lord's going to call you to do at all, fondly. He simply wants to you to be whatever you are, whatever your position, for him. He wants to live through you. The Lord Jesus isn't in your office unless he's in you in your office.
The Lord Jesus isn't in the coffee classes in your neighborhoods, lady. I'm glad he's in you in that gathering of the women. And I believe in things like that. I wish more of our sisters got their neighbors together over a cup of coffee or a cup of tea and had a little visit about the Lord's Day. We've got several of those going in Colorado Springs. We just think they're wonderful. Our sisters are winning souls in Colorado Springs by getting their neighbors together, just having a little cup of coffee together and having a discussion about the war things or playing one of my tapes with them and furnishing them a number about the number of them.
A little message in the gospel and then discussing with them. The Lord is not going to be in those places where you are unless he's there in you. It's the only way the world will ever see. But then he did something else. He stripped himself of the robe that was on him and gave it to David and his garments. No, I'm indebted to our brother, Mr. Harold Wildish, for whom I spent last week, for some thoughts about this. He pointed out to me that garments of the Scripture often stand for our conduct. In the Fourth of Ephesians, for instance, we're to put off the old man in his deeds and put on Christ.
The role of the outer garments. That's all you saw at first. You saw the man's conduct, or his position. But then if you were in the same home with Jonathan, he would lay aside this robe when he came into the house and put it away, and then he would see him in the rest of his garments. You would see his conduct. There will be many places where you would see his other garments, besides just his positional robe. What about your contract? Well, you say that's the thing that bothers me.
I go on pretty well for a while, and then I flip my lid. I go on for a while and then I forget myself, and I say things I shouldn't say, and I do things I shouldn't do, and I know, I know, exactly, and don't excuse it, and don't say that it runs in your family, you can't help it, just call it what it is, just call it, and confess it to the Lord who's sin, and then take that conduct of yours, and lay it at the feet of David, say, Lord, I want my entire conduct in the home, in the neighborhood, in the assembly, in the nation.
I want my entire conduct to be laid at thy feet. And then don't forget to do it every day, because most of the time we take it back right quick after we give it. But then he didn't stop there, even to his sword. I don't suppose I would handle the sword very well. When I was a boy, I sometimes got a hold of the stick and carried a few bows and some other boy until one of us got her knuckles in. But I don't suppose I'd get very far in sword drill.
They say it's quite an art, and some people study fencing. I don't know why. All fencing I ever did was go on the farm. But they say that they do a little fencing, you know, they learn how to use this sword, and, oh, it's quite an art. It represents the skills of our life. You don't just pick up a sword and start to use it. You have to learn how to use it. Now, David never learned to use the sword. That's why he said, don't pay. When Saul wanted to put his armor on him. But then he reaches into his shepherd's bag, and he pulls out that little trusty slingshot.
He'd use that. But you see, whatever we had in the way of skills, we need to lay them at the feet of the Lord Jesus. There are young people here this morning. Have you laid at the feet of the Lord Jesus your skill? If I don't know how you can use my particular skill, you might be surprised. You might be surprised. I don't think there's anything that God can't use. Now, don't misunderstand me. I don't believe that the gifts of First Corinthians fourteen are needability gifts. I don't believe that because I was born with a good voice that the Lord naturally intends for me to preach.
It just might be the boom of an empty drum. There's got to be something behind the voice. It isn't just having the voice. But the voice that all with all other skills that I may have ought to be laid at the feet of our David. Amen. When you say, I'm an old man now, I'm an old woman, and what could I give to him? He might have some things to give, but the young people can't give. But if you put it in his feet, it isn't the matter how big it is. The little boy with his lunch, Handed it to Jesus. And the Lord never took that away from the boy.
Don't you think for a minute that he just said, Give me that. The Lord never had it back. If you don't give it up to him, he'll never get it. But that boy, although there were five thousand men besides the women and children to be fed, and anybody could have told his son, you might as well eat your lunch yourself. There's no use giving that to the Lord. It doesn't be any good at all here. It's too little. Yet the boy gave it to the Lord Jesus, and the Lord used it. And I found that he uses the little nothings that we had, and makes something out of it.
And then he gave his bows. Now his bow, the bow of David tells us of his influence. You see, with a bow, you can shoot an arrow way over there. It isn't just here. Our influence is what reaches out. Our influence is what makes us useful or harmful. And all of it has some influence. There are many people who think they have good. There are many people who think that it doesn't carry ice at all how they live.
Because they're so small and so insignificant and so unimportant that it really doesn't matter. But let me tell you, Noah's family is stronger than its weakest link. Its weakest member. No person. No person is unimportant. And you and I are either going to be of use to God or of use to the dead. Our influence is going to count one way or another. With that bow and that arrow, I might bring down an enemy, or with that I might shoot a brother.
That's a sad part of it. My influence might hurt my fellow Christians, or it might help. Do I believe that? When I go to the meeting, in the midweek meeting, to the prayer meeting, Bible study, do I say before I go, now Lord, keep me. My influence tonight might be for good or for bad. My very presence there and the attitude that I take and the way I look might discourage or encourage another brother or sister. Lord, help me to be careful. And then he took off his girdle.
Now, the girdle that a man wore in that time was not a support to make him look young. What he wore in those days was a money belt. All of his resources were worn in this inner girdle, underneath his garment. And that's the last thing he'd give up. After all, I've given my robe to David. What more can David want? And David, our David, will never be satisfied without all of our resources.
He said, let's go too far. I'm not going too far, I'm willing to give him ten percent, but don't ask me to give everything. Why not? Didn't he give everything? Did he? Amen. The Lord had given you ten percent of his love and ten percent of his time. So unthinkable. He gave himself. He had nowhere to lay his head. He died. How can I do less than give him my best? Yes, give him my all, and live for him completely after all he's done for me.
The Lord says, He laid that money there, not in a girdle. It represented his money, his jewels, whatever he had in the land of treasures. He laid that at the feet of David. Does that mean he went away from there broke? But don't be foolish. David loves Jonathan, too, as well as Jonathan loving David. You give to the Lord Jesus what we do. You turn right around and give back to him. Now, don't let me understand. I do not believe that people who are generous in their giving can expect to get rich. I don't believe in the New Testament at all. And I think it's a mighty poor motive anyway.
I know that God often does entrust more to people who have been good stewards, but I see no guarantee of it. That's what I mean. I see no promise of it in the New Testament. Maybe the Lord wants you to give what you've got, and he isn't going to give you a thing back, but it gives something better. I know men who have given up financial resources to the Lord, and the Lord in turn has given them an ability in the Scriptures who's simply horrible. They gave up the riches of this world, and he gave them the true riches. I believe he does that oftentimes. But anyway, remember there are days that love us, far better than we love him.
If a child says to her mother, Mother, I love you so much, today I'm just going to do anything you want me to do. And mother says, nah, I got her. I'll fix you today. Oh, no, she doesn't. Her mother's heart goes out to that child and she says, my child wants to sleep. And now I want to make her happy, too. And they end up doing farm lessons and the girl could have chosen for herself. Am I right? Amen. Did you ever let the Lord choose for you and find out she got sick in bed? Like the little boy who went in the grocery store. And the grocerman told him to help himself, a handful of peanuts. And he stood there and acted bashful, and finally the grocerman picked up a handful and gave it to him.
Boy took him to these two hands and walked out with his dad. His dad said, why didn't you take a handful when he told you to him? He said, he's got bigger hands. He doesn't say, Grossman picked up a handful. He gets two hands full. If you let the Lord Jesus pick out for you and you're alive what he wants to give, you'll get a double handful. You'll get it every time. I'm not telling you anything new. Well, that's what Jonathan did for David. And then he went out to witness for David, because when you love a person, it's easy to talk about them. It'd be much easier for you to win souls if the Lord had really won your heart, wouldn't it?
If he holds your whole being in life, it's much easier to witness for it. I wish I could end the story there. I guess I will. I don't like to talk about what happened after this. Poor Jonathan didn't follow the Lord Jesus. There's a rejection. He didn't follow him in the cave of the dove. And I wondered if maybe it's because he didn't lay his shoes on that pile that he was offering today. He didn't give his walk completely to David. There were some reservations. There were some things that he still wanted for himself.
That's always our favorite, my dear sisters. We never have failed in giving David too much, our Lord Jesus. But we have failed time and again once we withheld, because our hearts were not warmed toward him. Amen. Our lesson, Lord Jesus, we look to thee with shameful faces when we think how much thou hast loved us, and how much thou hast given for us, and how little response there has been from our heart. We pray that they help us to be sincere about these things, to be practical about these things, We pray that before this day is over, each of us who know thee will find some time in thy presence, to lay at thy feet, perhaps for the first time, perhaps just reminding ourselves again, that we and all that we have belong to thee.
We thank the Our Father for giving thy Son for us. We thank you for making this our own. We thank you for thy Holy Spirit's power to make all these things possible and real in our life. We have nothing.