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Well, hello once more, and a very good morning to you. It is a great pleasure to see you all present and your eager faces betokening your desire to come to the word of God and to be encouraged in your hearts by what the Lord will have to say. For those of you who were not here yesterday, let me just point out that in this current series of Bible studies, we are considering the books of Chronicles, and we're considering them from the, under the general title of Mankind's Pathway to the Coming Age of Peace and Glory.
Tomorrow, God willing, we shall be talking about the founding of Jerusalem and the unification of the people of God. Thursday, the coming of the Lord to Jerusalem and the execution of justice and judgment. Friday, we shall think of the topic of the putting down of the last enemies and how one day the kingdom of the world shall become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ. And finally, as the final stage towards the coming age of peace and glory, we shall be thinking of advanced preparation for the building of God's temple and the orchestration and worship and service of God.
Today, however, we are to consider the rise of Israel from among the nations and the emergence of God's obedient king. So let's begin by turning to scripture, if you have a Bible with you, the first book of Chronicles, and we return this morning to the first section of that book. That is the famous chapters, I dare not say the infamous chapters, but these are the chapters that are full of those long, impossibly long, some people think, impossibly long lists of names, and they are genuinely difficult, aren't they? Happy is the man who is not called upon to read them out in public.
But, um, some of the difficulty is this, you'll see, that in the Hebrew Bible, the books of Chronicles stand at the end of the Bible. They belong to the third division, the writings, the Kethuthim, and they stand at the end of scripture, very appropriately so, because in their account of things, they take the grand view, follow the sweep of history from the very word go and the creation of Adam, right down through all the Old Testament history to the point of Israel's return from exile, and perhaps one or two or three generations beyond that.
Because that is so, the books of Chronicles will refer to past people. They won't always tell you the story of those people, for the simple reason they haven't got the space to do it. To do that would mean rewriting the whole of the Old Testament. And here they count on your knowledge of the Old Testament. A tough going, isn't it, what? People are going to expect you to know all about First Samuel and Second Samuel and goodness knows what. Tough going. Hmm. It could be, you know, embarrassing if you had the Lord Jesus one of these days for lunch, and innocently asked a question or something, and he would turn round, as he was accustomed to do, and say, and have you never read what David did when he went into the temple and took the showbread?
And you go, oh, dear me, I hope he won't ask me, uh, when I last read that story. He was always doing that, wasn't he? Have you never read? And the only escape from such embarrassment is to make sure you've read it, you know, in good time before the Lord asks you the question. And so when the writer of Chronicles says it all began with Adam, he doesn't tell you the story of Adam all over again. He expects you to know that, and to know who Abram was and what he did, and how one generation led to another, and what the affairs were around the names that he records. So we come back this morning to those lists of names.
Yesterday we noticed that as the chronicler begins his story with Adam and proceeds, he spends very little time indeed on summarizing the affairs of men and things until he comes to Israel, that is Jacob and his sons. Once beginning that story, he fills a tremendous large space with the tribe of Judah, and then in particular with the family of David the king, and once more with the names of the people of Judah. For there lies the chronicler's interest in history, the emergence of the tribe of Judah from Israel's nation, and preeminently the emergence in Judah of the lion of the tribe of Judah, which in the first place was David, and then his son Solomon.
Today we notice that the writer has another major interest. It records the rise of Israel, but he doesn't give every tribe of Israel the same space and the same publicity. Just as he gives tremendous prom- pro- pro- uh, prominence to Judah and David, so from chapter six onwards, he gives an equal prominence to the sons of Levi. Just look at the page, we won't read the names so you won't get hurt, but uh, uh, look at chapter six and the whole of its eighty one verses is about the tribe of Levi. That's chapter six.
In seven he begins to talk about other tribes. But look what happens when he comes to chapter nine. He's talking here about the people that inhabited Jerusalem, presumably after Israel came back from the exile. And at verse ten he begins to talk of the priests, and then verse fourteen of the Levites, and how David organized them and where they lived and what their tasks were. And in fact, the whole of the rest of chapter nine right down to verse thirty three is once more concerned with the priests and the Levites. The reason for that is that in the subsequent history, the chronicler is going to remind you of what one of the chiefest interests of King David was.
Great warrior that he was, nevertheless, deep in his heart, as the prime object of his ambitions was this, that one day he should build in Jerusalem city a temple to God, and in that temple there should be the praise of God carried on daily. No hit and hit and miss affair was this to be. This was a whole nation organized down to his last man and led by the priests and the Levites to think it their chief purpose in this life, to praise Almighty God, their creator, and to enjoy God and to sing his praise, and if I may dare say so, as a sober the- theologian, to get excited about God and seeing the wonders of God, to wish to praise him, not only with our vocal chords, but with our hearts, and not only with our hearts, but our hands and our feet and our body, and live the whole of life to the praise of God.
That was David's ambition. Political power took a very second place with David compared with that ambition, so much so that when he got to retiring age or before, he took semi-retirement, as a good man would be, a good many men would be well advised to do, and uh, uh, made his son vice regent with him, you see, so that the son could look after the administration of the nation, while David would give himself to his lifelong ambition to prepare the temple of God and to prepare the Levites and to orchestrate, orchestrate their worship of the Lord, so that life might be one great act of worship of God.
And then, as life was organized around the temple, and the glory of God took hold of the people, the people's activity as they went about their farming, as they went about their business, should be an expression of the character of God, that Israel might be known among the nations as a priesthood to God, first to worship God, and then to tell out my soul the glory of the Lord to all who lived around and came in contact with them. Hence this emphasis on the Levites. I know you haven't read it recently, but you wouldn't be half proud, would you, if your name should happen to be listed there, you'd tell everybody in the neighborhood, did you know my name was in the Bible?
Where? In Chronicles. You wouldn't have to be surprised that they had never read it, but, uh, oh, you would be hasty to show them, wouldn't you? My name, that, that was my granny, that was my grandfather. You'd have to be aware of the, uh, the question that would follow that, and are you living like they did? But, uh, now we must notice how this section of Chronicles comes to its end. It is chapter ten. We are to be told that before the King David was king, there was another king, the first king in Israel.
And we're to read what happened to him. Chapter ten of Chronicles then, now the Philistines fought against Israel, and the men of Israel fled from before the Philistines and fell down slain in Mount Gilboa. And the Philistines followed hard after Saul and after his sons, and the Philistines slew Jonathan and Abinadab and Melchishua, the sons of Saul. And the battle went sore against Saul, and the archers overtook him, and he was distressed by reason of the archers. Then said Saul unto his armor bearer, draw thy sword and thrust me through therewith, lest these uncircumcised come and abuse me.
But his armor bearer would not, for he was sore afraid. Therefore Saul took his sword and fell upon it. And when his armor bearer saw that Saul was dead, he likewise fell upon his sword and died. So Saul died, and his three sons, and all his house died together. When all the men of Israel saw that they were, that were in the valley, saw that they fled, and that Saul and his sons were dead, they forsook their cities and fled, and the Philistines came and dwelt in them. And it came to pass on the morrow, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, that they found Saul and his sons fallen in Mount Gilboa, and they stripped him and took his head and his armor and sent him to the land of the Philistines round about to carry the tidings unto their idols and to the people.
And they put his armor in the house of their gods and fastened his head in the house of Dagon. And when all Jabesh Gilead heard all that the Philistines had done to Saul, all the valiant men arose and took away the body of Saul and the bodies of his son, and brought them to Jabbus and buried their bones under the oak in Jabbus and fasted seven days. So Saul died for his trespass, which he committed against the Lord, because of the word of the Lord which he kept not, and also for that he asked counsel of one that had a familiar spirit to inquire thereby, and he inquired not of the Lord, therefore he slew him and turned the kingdom unto David, the son of Jesse.
God give us good understanding of his word. We saw yesterday that when the chronicler comes to describe the tremendous glories of the golden age of peace and plenty that occurred under David and then under Solomon, that he gives vent to what appears to be an exaggerated expression. He says that when they made Solomon king the second time, then Solomon sat on the throne of the Lord. We took him to mean in the first place simply that this was the throne that God had instituted, and that Solomon, being the king chosen of God to follow David, when Solomon ascended that throne, he was sitting as God's representative on the throne of Israel that God himself had established.
And we rejoiced at the chronicler's sense of history, beginning with Adam, made in the image of God, and following the long travail of history down the road, it comes to the point when at last a man sits on the throne of the Lord. That golden age didn't last, we all know that. The chronicler is going to tell us, we don't need to tell him. And all Earth's proud empires shall likewise pass away. We should be sitting here perhaps, in a mood of pessimism, would you, did we not know this, that one day in Bethlehem, in the town of David, there was born to David, King David's greatest son, Jesus Christ the Lord, born in Bethlehem, crucified at Calvary, and risen from the dead.
And we rejoiced yesterday with all our heart to think that our blessed Lord Jesus, truly human as we are at this very moment, sits in the absolute sense on the throne of the Lord. And then we allowed ourselves to rejoice and enjoy the stupendous fact that according to the promise of the New Testament that one day, as he overcame and sat down on his father's throne, we, if we overcome, shall sit down with him on his throne, and we shall reign with him for all God's eternity.
This morning we have to be told that there was a king before David. A king of Israel appointed by God to govern his people. But he never sat on the throne of the Lord. You'd be sorry for Saul, wouldn't you? Poor man. He'd never wanted to be king in the first place. And tried to be, but he never sat upon the throne of the Lord, and that for the obvious reason. He died, says Scripture, for his trespass which he committed against the Lord.
And because of the word of the Lord that he kept not. Saul himself, king of Israel, turned rebel against God, and given his word to obey, disobeyed it and didn't keep it. How could God ever possibly put on the throne of the Lord a man that was prepared to disobey God to his very face? Amidst all the wonderful euphoria of thinking about the age that shall be, and how the Church of Christ shall reign with Christ and sit with him on his throne as he overcame and sat on his father's throne, my dear brethren and sisters, this we must remember.
The terms of salvation are these, that our blessed Lord Jesus, in the days of his flesh, Son of God though he was, he learned obedience by the things that he suffered, and being made perfect and qualified, he became the author of salvation to, to, to those that obey him. It stands to reason, it is utterly unthinkable that God should ever put upon the throne of the Lord those hearts that are not prepared to take his word seriously and obey his word.
How can he put on the throne of the Lord men and women that positively trespass against him? And alas for Saul, placed as king by God himself, supposedly to obey God himself, and to bring the people to obey God and deliver them from the power of the very devil. Saul at last succumbed to the sophisticated temptations of his satanic majesty, went over to the other side, inquired of an evil spirit, and he died, and all his house died, and he never sat on the throne of the Lord.
Perhaps you think in your heart that that's tough justice. Well, it is tough being king of a nation, surely it is. And if your task as king of the nation is not only to lower the income tax at the election to curry favor with the people, but your task is to get the people to obey God, then you certainly have a tough time to face. How can it be done? But you see, it follows likewise. But unless we can get people to obey God, or somebody can, there never will be a paradise for them. It's no good delighting ourselves with little fairy stories.
The chaos of our present world is attributable directly not to simply the mass murderers. It's attributable to the fact that in every heart of ours there lies what the Bible technically calls the flesh that is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. Rebels against God. Unless that rebellion can be overcome, and men and women made priests to God, a kingdom to obey God, and priests to worship and serve God, how will there ever be a paradise of any sort whatever.
Feel sorry for Saul. I don't think he ever understood the problem, did he? The difficulty. Where lies the difficulty? The Chronicle reminds us by the very first word that he pens in his book. Adam is the difficulty. Created by God and put in a paradise with every conceivable blessing around him, such as his age of innocence could then enjoy. But he fell. And he ruined the paradise. And how did he manage to do that? Well, not by beating up Eve every morning before breakfast or anything ludicrous and lurid like that.
The satanic majesty had much more sophisticated designs and temptations. Tricked our first parents into that fatal stance, that fatal attitude, both towards God and to creation around us. Fatal stance of independence of God. Take that fruit, my dear, said he. No, no, said he. We're able to, we're told we may eat of all the other trees in the garden, but God has said, oh, nonsense. Nobody nowadays takes that to be the, the truth.
That's Sunday school stuff, my dear. Grow up, woman. Make up your own mind. You don't need to bother about the word of God. Fruit's nice, isn't it, woman? Good for your stomach, good for your mind to make you wise, good for your heart and eyes. It's good to look at. That's life, woman. Take it. Bother God and his word. The only reason why God lays down his rules is to keep you down. He knows that in the day you eat it, you shall be as God and independent. It was that grasp at independence, rebelling against God's word, that introduced chaos into our world and is responsible at the root for the vast tree of iniquity and disorder and violence and jealousy and envy and every other hateful thing that turns our potentially paradisical world into a minor hell.
And Saul was appointed king to rule people like that and bring them back to God. And I ask, would you do it? It wasn't that God didn't train him. I like the stories that are told us in Samuel about God's efforts to train Saul for the kingship. They might strike your modern sophisticated mind as being a little simple.
They're certainly not the techniques of the Harvard Business School of, uh, of economics and politics. But then you see, sometimes the simpler things get at the root of the matters more quickly, don't they? He was Saul. He was a farmer, or a farmer's son, you know. I had some, uh, donkeys, and you know what? The asses of his father went astray. Stupid beasts. Never intended to go astray, of course. But there you are, you know what asses are, don't you? Dumb, mindless beasts, as stubborn as they can be once they get an idea into their beheads.
It can be a very simple idea, but there's no getting it out of them. They'll put their feet down and fight for their way. They're gonna have it. And the asses of Saul's father went astray. So his father asked him to go and find the asses, and he set out. Comparatively easy task, isn't it, if you hold asses? You could easily find where they got to and bring them back and get them behaving as they should. So he went here, but they weren't here, and he went there, but they weren't there, and he went somewhere else, and they weren't somewhere else. And in the end, he was getting all muddled up himself around the intricate lanes and villages of the, uh, of the terrain, till he said to his servant, look here, we're in a mess ourselves.
I'm not quite sure where we got to ourselves now. Where on earth are we? He got lost himself. He said, you know, we better pack up thinking about these donkeys. Be a bad job if we ourselves got lost, wouldn't it, waho, in the pro- in the process? Let's go home. Said his servant. Well, so he said, you know, it just so happens that we're in a place where there's a city here and there's a prophet there. Oh, he says, oh, so. Wouldn't it be an idea, so he said, if we were to consult the prophet and therefore consult God? Oh, oh, well, that's a thought. Hadn't occurred to me before, said Saul, but, uh, well, yeah, well, now we're here, we might as well.
So, uh, oh, half a minute, said he, we haven't got any money to pay the cap, and you know these prophets, they cost a lot. So, I mean, my bread has run out and I've all got rid of my bank balance is down and I've nothing with me to pay it, you see. Ha, ha, what do we do? Well, it so happens, said his servant, I've got a bit of spare cash in my pocket. Oh, marvelous man. Well, that's extraordinary. Well, we take advantage of that, said he. So in they went to the city, and there were some girls standing there, bright maidens like they generally are, and and and they said, here, could you tell us where the, uh, where the, uh, prophet is? Well, they said, you know, you've just, you've just come in the nick of time. Curious thing, we've got a feast today, and uh, uh, the prophet is going to come and bless the sacrifice, and the people won't eat until he comes.
Hope Saul was listening. That was part of his training. Uh, the, the people won't eat until he comes, and they won't sacrifice either. So go up, he's going up to the high place there, and we'll come across him. But this was marvelous. This was extraordinary coincidence. So on they went and marched, and there was an elderly gentleman standing, and they said, ah, sir, excuse me, uh, could you tell me where the prophet's house is? He said, I am the prophet. Oh, yes, he said, I was expecting you. Expecting me? Yes. God told me last night you were coming. Really? Is life like that? Is there a living God who knows about me, who knows even about my stupid donkeys and the mess I'm in trying to find them and get them back again?
Is there a God that condescends to take notice of even the little details of life like that? Come, said Samuel to Saul, the people are waiting, and I got a tremendous something to tell you, the chief post of honor in the whole of Israel. God is going to give it to you, Saul. So come and sit down, men, for I told the cook, and the cook has prepared a double portion for you. And there, as he filled his mouth with good old beef. No doubts about it then. I wonder, did the message get home to his heart, that the God who was calling him to be king was a God that was prepared to stand behind him?
And if Saul would learn to trust him, would order the circumstances, and God would bring back the asses. What is that you said, Samuel? I said, don't worry about your asses, Saul. We know where they are. God knows where they are. We found them anyway. They're going to come back. The next morning, being anointed and about to go back to face this onerous task, he was told by Samuel, look, there are three circumstances going to happen that will put you in peculiar need. As each one arises, you will find that God has anticipated it, Saul, and he will make provision for you. And so they came to pass. An extraordinary exhibition of the government and the providence of God in this man's life.
God desperately trying to teach him that if he's ever going to rule for God, he must know the rule of God in his own life. If ever he's going to get people to trust and obey the Lord, he must learn himself to trust and obey the Lord. And with the responsibilities that were to be on his shoulders, sometimes that would be a big order to dare trust the Lord. So having been put through his schooling, Saul was put through his examinations. And the first one was this: You are not to begin the battle, Saul, until I, Samuel the prophet, come and offer the sacrifice.
You get that? Don't you remember, Saul, how when you came to seek me, the people wouldn't start the sacrifice until I came, Saul? Now this time you are not to start the battle until I come and offer the sacrifice. So there was Saul, and there were the Philistines, and they came out in their battalions and increased with all their armor. And when the people of Israel saw them, they got the coglywoggles in the stomach and began to flee away. And Saul said, what shall I do? What shall I do? I can't let the people run away from me. I shall be left without any people. I must start. Where is this prophet? And he didn't appear, and he seemed to be late himself and was about to commit the people to battle when the prophet appeared and said, you foolish man, you.
Yes, he was a fool, wasn't he? You see, to start with, the Philistines weren't going to have any battle. They were just on maneuvers. There never was a battle. And the second thing was that the Philistines were armed to the teeth, whereas the Israelites, poor souls, had very little more than a few sort of pea shooter things. And if Saul had taken the armies into battle with the Philistines that day, Israel would have been cut to ribbons. How could God entrust the people of God to a man like that? That would jeopardize the lives of thousands of his followers simply because he couldn't trust God's word and do what God said.
Sir, if you were going into an operation, uh, for kidneys taken out or something, and the anaesthetist didn't turn up, and the surgeon said, well, can't, well, I must operate anyway, so we just have to go ahead without the anaesthetist. Would you appoint him head of all the college of surgeons? He couldn't keep the word of God. He wasn't to be entrusted with the lives of God's people then. A bigger test came. There was an outstanding enemy of the people of God and of God himself. It was the nation of Amalek and their king. This was the nation that when God was bringing Israel out of bondage in Egypt and taking them to their promised inheritance, this king came out in his nation, and they said, no, you don't.
And lifted up their hand not only against Israel, but against God's very throne itself, and defied God. God swore he would have war with them from generation to generation until Amalek was no more. And the second test, of course, for Saul's kingship was this, said the prophet, in the name of God, I want you to go with your army and obliterate Amalek. Spare nothing. Positive, clear command. As the people returned from the battle and Saul at their head, Samuel went to meet him.
How's it gone? said Samuel. Very well, said Saul. I've done everything. You've done everything, really? What's all this lowing of sheep I hear and oxen and things and bleatings and what have you? Well, that you, you see, well, it's like this, Samuel. Don't get, don't get up, said Samuel, you see, but you know what the people are, you see, and you know how difficult it is sometimes, and if I were to insist that they would obey scripture, well, the people might all, uh, all, uh, forsake me, you see. And the people wanted to spare the flocks, you see. Uh, Samuel, so we, we spared the flocks, and uh, uh, what we propose to do with these flocks is to offer them in sacrifice to God. Won't that be nice, Samuel?
And Samuel said, you are a fool. You suppose you can carry on being king? When you take an express command of Almighty God to destroy the rebel that would overturn God's throne, and you compromise with him. And having disobeyed the command of the Lord and spared the rebel, do you suppose you're going to offer your disobedience to God as a sacrifice to God? You can no longer be king. It's true to the logic, isn't it?
Man shall sit upon the throne of the Lord. But on whose authority? And on what conditions? Had the Lord had me sitting on his throne, only to find that I'm not even prepared to carry out his word, and go my own way, and spare the rebel, and then offer it all up as a supposed thanksgiving to God. Our Lord himself once observed, didn't he? Of the seriousness of those who are in office. Whosoever shall break one of the least of these commandments and teach other men so to break them shall be least in the kingdom of God.
Saul had to be deposed. Even then, God loved him. Couldn't be king anymore. But God sent him a savior. But Saul was a very big man, as you know, trusted in his being a big man. He had a big sized brain, had Saul, and big size arms, and he was master man, you know, of the wrestling and all that. One day they came out of the camp of the Philistines. They came out a man the size of Sleeve Donald. You colossal great chap, you'll say. Come to threaten the people of God and denounce the God of Israel as a mere nothing.
And big man Saul, when he saw this bigger man Goliath, skulked away into his tent, absolutely scared. And David, with his bright ruddy cheeks, came from the sheep and said, Saul, I'll go out and kill him. Of course I will, Saul. Saul said, you can't go out. He's a big man, look at him. Yes, I will, says, uh, David. I'll tell you the secret, Saul. You know, I'm a farmer's boy, and I keep the sheep, and one day there came a lion to the sheep, and another day a bear. I couldn't possibly have mastered those enemies of the flock myself. But it's a God, Saul, and I trusted him, little shepherd boy that I was, and I dared to trust him, and I went out, and God gave me the victory over those evil beasts.
I delivered the sheep. I know God, Saul. I know it's only in these small things of life, but it's in the small things of life where you learn to obey God and trust God, Saul. And now the big crisis has come, and that same God whom I have proved, I will now find to be real. Take my sword, says Saul. That'll help. Silly chump. Goliath got a spear like a telegraph pole. David had gone to him with Saul's sword, wrap him in the soul. Uh, Goliath, let me come near a bit nearer while, while I put that thing down while I cut your head off. Absurd.
He wouldn't have got within yards of him before Goliath would have skewered him on the end of his spear. I come to you, says David, addressing the giant, not with big armor. I come with feeble weapons to demonstrate the weakness of God is wiser than men. And the, uh, uh, the weakness of God is stronger than men, and the folly of God is wiser than men. I come with these despicable little weapons that everybody may see that the battle is the Lord's. I come to you in the name of the Lord, whom you've had defied. That was how the battle was won, and God saved Saul and the nation.
Then what did Saul do? That's a very curious but easily credible reaction of the human heart. He wouldn't have his savior. Proud of himself, trusting his own self now, his own wisdom and his power rather than David's God. He so persecuted David, Messiah anointed of God though David was, until David was forced to run away and went to the Gentiles and the nation of Israel was left without their Messiah.
And the Philistines got Saul in the end. They cut off that big head. They stripped his arms, nailed them up in their temple, a triumph for Philistinism. The Philistines lived in a world where God didn't really count, not the living God. It was the biggest man that ruled the show. You'll feel sorry for Saul, wouldn't you? And your heart would shed its tears for the nation of Israel, Saul's descendants, unable to save themselves, and God gave them as their savior, David's great, David's greater son, born in Bethlehem, come to be Israel's savior, and he came to his own, and his own received him not, but put him to a cross, and Israel lost her Messiah to the Gentiles these two thousand years.
Well, thank God, Israel shall yet again be restored. The Messiah shall come again. You say, what better was David than, than Saul? Wasn't David full of mistakes? Yes, he was. The inspired historian doesn't attempt to show that David was sinless, but this he had. In his heart there was, in spite of all his failure, a burning desire to please God and obey him. And yes, conscious himself that all his strength and his wisdom reposed in God. He was, as we said at the beginning of the lecture, he was a man consumed with his ambition to build the temple of God in the very midst and heart of Israel, and so to organize the priests and the Levites that the nation would not only come to obey God, but their life should be centered on God, and their daily occupation be the praise of the Creator.
So far for David. But this morning, in our closing moments, we move over to great David's greater son, and what Saul could never do, Jesus Christ has and will yet perform. Is it not so? I tell you first the marvelous story of God's true final king. How first he proved himself worthy of the throne by obedience. What a story that is.
Who, being in the very form of God, thought it not a thing to be grasped at to be on equal terms with God, but emptied himself. Took upon him the form of a servant. Being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself yet further and became obedient, and his obedience took him to the death of the tree. A mere martyr's death could have been a glorious end. Men have been known to covet the death of a martyr because of these, uh, the fame it brings them.
But consider the death of our Lord Jesus and explain it to me if you can. The death that he was asked to die, God's perfect, sinless son. Who had never gone astray from his father's will. The death he was asked to die was to come and die for a world full of wretched rebels, the likes of you and me. Whereas in Gethsemane, he showed the anguish of his spirit, faced with such a task like that, to bear the penalty of the rebels, the God-defying, God-forgetting rebels.
Said he at last, not my will, but thine be done. He came obedient unto death. Wherefore, God has highly exalted him, given him a name above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the earth. Ah, but I tell you more of his successors. You remember the glorious vision that was given to John the Apostle and recorded in his book of the Revelation and chapters four and five.
There John was given to see the creatorial throne of God, and all the hosts of heaven bowing in their worship to the worthiness of the Creator who sits upon the throne, and the logic is very simple. Thou art worthy, they say, to receive the honor and the power and the riches and the glory. Why art worthy? Because of your creatorial rights. Thou hast made all things, and for thy will they are and were created, and not a thing that moves, not a grain of sand in all the vast, vast, vast universe.
Any other reason for existence than it should serve the pleasure of God. Anybody hearing that announcement must perceive its logic. If that is the raison d'être of the universe's existence, it's gone astray, hasn't it? We have turned everyone to his own way. God isn't going to wait forever. God has his plans for the redevelopment of the universe. Will not wait forever. God is determined that the new heavens and new earth are not to be ruined again by that so same kind of rebellion on the part of his creatures.
And so the book is delivered, the book that was pronounced the judgments of God upon a godless world, that God might clear the world of its sinners and start again. And the cry is heard, who is worthy? Who is worthy to take the book, to loose its seal, and start the judgments that shall clear the world of rebels. You say, why doesn't he start at once? God has the right to. However, God is not merely concerned with his rights. He's a God of power and of justice, but a God who, having created his creatures, will be loyal to them for the last.
Hear the name announced of the great sovereign king who is worthy to take the book, and hear again the terms of his worthiness. Thou art worthy to take the book and to undo its seals, for thou hast slain. The king himself, slain by rebel hands and offering the rebels pardon from God, obtained by that very slaughter. Our not only redeemed them by his blood, thou hast redeemed us from every tribe, cult, people, country, tongue, and nation, but not only forgiven us, made us, made us a kingdom, made us people that long to obey God and have found the resources wherewith to obey him, and made us a kingdom of priests to worship him, to love him, to grow excited about him and want to serve him.
The kingdom of priests to worship him and to go out and proclaim the glories of him who has called us out of darkness into his marvelous light. Oh, thank God in your heart. Chaotic as this world may still be, God's great work of restoration has already started. The man is in his place, and he's on the throne of God. He shall yet bring the whole universe to the feet of the creator and yield it to him, perfected under his control. But it's a startling thing, isn't it? That before heaven, earth, and hell, the worthiness of the Lamb to rule is put in these terms, what he has made of you and me.
You get that? I want worthy to rule because you've made those people in Northfield a kingdom. Is it true? Is it true, my brother? Or is it this, it is just religious talk? Is it true in your heart? Could I open the door of your heart and look inside? I say again, is it true, my brother? Would you say to me, in spite of my failings, yes, yes, yes, this is what I desire, and nothing more than this, to live to God's glory and praise and to obey him.
But to add, there's not one command of scripture that I know of that I'm not prepared to obey. Oh, you see, God not only saves you one day, he wants to put you on the throne of Christ, but it must be this, to then that, obey him. Oh God, help us to learn these ancient lessons, so simple, so vivid, so deeply probing, so real. And today, may God inflame our hearts with love for the Savior, that in our heart of hearts we may again crown him Lord of all and say to him in our prayers, O thou son of David, thine we are and on thy side for now and for eternity.
