He was now preoccupied only with who God
was.
He'd learned from Abraham, God's friend, that the
blesser is greater than his blessings and the
giver greater than his gifts.
He'd rediscovered God and who God is.
And as I indicated yesterday, that nearly always
can be recognized in the way a man
prays.
O Lord, God of our fathers, art thou
our God?
I'm citing from the chapter where we concluded
yesterday.
It's the twentieth chapter of the second book
of Chronicles.
We're only going to glance at it just
for a brief few moments just to recapitulate
and recapture the main flow of God's revelation
to us of a perfect heart.
Art not thou, said he, God in heaven?
In the sixth verse, rulest not thou over
all the kingdoms of the heathen?
In thine hand is there not power and
might so that none is able to withstand
thee?
Rediscovered God, the God who is, art not
thou our God?
Present tense.
And he had discovered that the God who
is is the God who was, and the
God who was is the God who will
be, unchanging, in whom there's no shadow of
turning, neither any variableness.
No bravado now in the heart of Jehoshaphat,
that false dedication that says, I will and
I can and you can't and you don't.
True dedication says, I can't but God can,
and he will, and he does.
That was the substance of his prayer.
Behold, said he, verse eleven, how thy reward
is to come to cast us out of
thy possession which thou hast given to us,
to inherit anything that is legitimately ours is
yours that you have made available to us,
all that a man is, available to all
that God is, knowing that all that God
is is available to the man who is
available to all that God is.
That's mutual inter-availability.
That was the life of our Lord Jesus
as he demonstrated that true humanity on earth
for which he as our creator made man
the creature.
How available was the Lord Jesus to the
Father, totally.
I do only those things that please him.
How available was the Father to the Son,
totally.
He knew that the Father had given all
things into his hands.
So there was mutual inter-availability and that's
why there was no margin of difference between
what the Lord Jesus did as man and
the Father did as God.
What he said as man and the Father
said as God, what he was as man
and the Father was as God.
When Philip came and said, show us the
Father, said he, take a big look.
Don't you realize, Philip, that I'm enjoying that
relationship for which I made man.
I am in my Father and my Father
is in me.
He that has seen me has seen my
Father.
You see, even the words that I speak
unto you, Philip, I speak not of myself.
They don't have their origin in me.
My Father who dwells in me, he does
the work.
He's the origin of everything I do and
say and am.
What I do, he does.
What I say, he says.
What I am, he is.
He that has seen me has seen him
that sent me.
Not because I'm God, Philip, though God I
am, but because though God I humbled myself,
was born a human being, emptied myself, made
myself nothing, deliberately chose to be all that
I as God made man to be without
God.
Nothing.
And you see, Jehoshaphat is rediscovering the principle
that must govern man's relationship to God and
God's relationship to man.
Oh, our God, said he in his prayer,
verse 12, Wilt thou not judge them?
We have no might against this great company
that cometh against us, neither know we what
to do.
But our eyes are upon thee.
We recognize now you, God, to be the
only legitimate source of those resources that you
so gladly make available to the man who's
got a perfect heart, conscious of his own
sin and his own bankruptcy, is prepared to
recognize that he cannot, but you, God, can.
And you're on tiptoe to demonstrate the fact.
Your eyes run to and fro throughout the
whole earth looking for any boy, girl, man,
or woman anywhere out of any nation, kindred,
tribe, tongue, race, creed, class, or color, who's
prepared to let you, God, show yourself strong
on their behalf.
You're not waiting for a man to be
man-sized for God, because man is too
small.
You're simply waiting for any man to let
God be God-sized in the man, because
he's the only one who's big enough for
the job.
This is a perfect heart.
And upon Jehaziel, verse 14, came the Spirit
of the Lord in the midst of the
congregation.
He said, verse 15, Hearken ye, all Judah,
ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, and thou King Jehoshaphat,
thus saith the Lord, until you be not
afraid, nor dismayed by reason of this great
multitude, the battle is not yours, it's God's.
In response in God's faithfulness, Jehoshaphat's faith, he's
drawn upon his resources and invoked the activity
of a mighty God.
In other words, he had learned that if
you fear God, nothing else can frighten you,
because the fear of God is the beginning
of wisdom.
You will not need to fight in this
battle, verse 17, set yourselves, stand you still,
and see the salvation of the Lord with
you.
Fear not, nor be dismayed, tomorrow God against
them, march, but in the confidence that you
are not fighting a victory, not fighting a
battle already lost.
As you did when you entered into that
unholy alliance with that wicked man, God's enemy,
Ahab, you're now celebrating a victory, already won.
And the Levites, verse 19, stood up to
praise the Lord God of Israel with a
loud voice on high.
Jehoshaphat, middle of verse 20, said, Hear me,
all Judah, ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, believe in
the Lord your God.
So shall you be established.
It's the only solid foundation upon which you
can safely build.
Believe his prophets.
Listen to what God has to say, and
do what he says, and you will prosper.
And when he had consulted with the people,
he appointed singers unto the Lord, and that
should praise the beauty of holiness.
He had discovered how beautiful holiness is.
As they went out before the army to
say, Praise the Lord, his mercy endureth forever.
And when they began to sing and to
praise in anticipation of a victory that was
no longer to be settled by their prowess
on the battlefield, but by a divine intervention
that would allow God to demonstrate that as
God, he's big enough for the job.
When they began to sing and to praise,
God set ambushments against the children of Ammon,
Moab, Mount Seir, which came against Judah, and
they were smitten.
And in verse 27, we are told they
returned every man of Judah and Jerusalem and
Jehoshaphat in the forefront of them to go
again to Jerusalem with joy.
Not congratulating themselves on their achievement, but recognizing
that it was the Lord that had made
them to rejoice over their enemies.
He was the only person to be congratulated.
A perfect heart that allows God to show
himself strong on your behalf, if only in
childlike simplicity and a recognition of our own
inherent bankruptcy, we'll lay the table with our
needs, stand back, bow ourselves out, and bow
him in.
And with a joyful heart, give thanks to
God for all his illimitable resources, the God
who no matter what the circumstances, never, ever
less than beginner.
Perfect heart.
You know, since God created man, billions of
babies have been born.
But when nearly 2,000 years ago, the
world heard a baby cry, it was the
biggest thing God ever said.
This is how it's recorded, as well you
know, in the first chapter of the epistle
to the Hebrews.
In many separate revelations, each of which set
forth a portion of the truth.
In different ways, God spake of old times
to forefathers by the prophets.
I'm reading from the second verse now, the
first chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews
in the Amplified New Testament.
In the last of these days, God has
spoken to us in the person of his
Son, whom he appointed heir, lawful owner of
all things, by and through whom he created
the worlds, the reaches of space and the
ages of time.
He made them, produced them, built them, operated,
arranged them in order.
He is the God who is.
And this Lord Jesus, the one who was
in the beginning with God, was God, and
by whom all things were made, and without
whom was not anything made that was made
in him exclusively, to be found that life
that is the light of men.
That which switches a man on and gives
him the moral competence to discharge the office
for which he was created, to reflect the
glory, because Christ himself living in your heart
is your only hope of glory.
Because he must, as God within the man,
the creator within the creature, be the origin
of his own image, source of his own
activity, dynamic of his own demands, remember, and
the cause of his own effect.
That word was made flesh.
He's the sole expression of the glory of
God.
He is the light being, the outraying of
the divine.
He is the perfect imprint and the very
image of God's nature.
And when he had by offering himself accomplished
our cleansing from sin, he sat down at
the right hand of the divine majesty on
high, God who at sundry times and in
divers manner spake in times past unto the
fathers by the prophets, hath in these last
days spoken unto us at the end of
the age by his son.
Biggest thing God ever said.
In anticipation of that event as elsewhere throughout
the pages of the Old Testament that foreshadowed
the coming of the one who would be
the substance of the shadow, in the 107th
Psalm, O give thanks unto the Lord, he
is good, his mercy endureth forever, let the
redeemed of the Lord say so.
For a very good reason, he's got something
to say.
Whom he hath redeemed from the hand of
the enemy, he satisfies the longing soul, he
filleth the hungry soul with goodness.
In the 14th verse, Psalm 107, he brought
them out of darkness and the shadow of
death, he break their bands in sunder.
And the 20th verse, he, God, sent his
word.
It was the biggest thing God ever said.
Then, he healed them and delivered them from
their destructions, who so is wise.
Verse 43 of that 107th Psalm, and will
observe these things, even they shall understand the
loving kindness of the Lord.
At the end of the age, the biggest
thing God ever said.
When God wants to say the biggest thing
he ever said, what do you think he's
looking for?
Human prowess, ingenuity, business acumen, five and a
half inch chin.
All he's looking for is a perfect heart
for the eyes of the Lord run to
and fro throughout the whole earth, looking for
any boy, girl, man, or anywhere through whom
he can accomplish his timeless ends, who knows
the end from the beginning.
Perfect heart.
Faithful is he that calleth you, who will
also do it.
Who's going to do that to which he
calls you?
The one who calls you to it.
And if you don't let him, you blew
it.
That's him.
That's carnal sweat instead of divine unction.
Faithful is he that calleth you, who will
also do it.
First Thessalonians chapter 5 and verse 24, and
then in the Philippian epistle, remember the second
chapter, says the Apostle Paul, delighting to preach
himself out of business.
He says, more in my absence than in
my presence, work out your own salvation, live
it up, because everything that God ever gave
me in the day that Jesus Christ invaded
my humanity to share with me his resurrection.
God gave you in the day that you
received him as your redeemer, and he came
to take up residence within your humanity.
So live it up.
Work out your own salvation.
Discover how wealthy you've become by virtue of
who he is, living the way he does.
The creator God, restored to the creature man,
God himself.
It's God who works in you, he says,
both to will and do of his good
pleasure.
Now if it's God who works in you
both to will and do of his good
pleasure, what would be illogical about anything that
God wills for your life or mine, if
he is the God who willed it, is
prepared to be the God who does it?
What would be illogical?
Nothing, whatever, nothing.
Faithful is he that calleth you who will
also do it, so what would be illogical
about anything to which God calls you, if
he is the God who calls you to
it, is prepared to do it, nothing.
And yet the Lord Jesus said, many are
called, but few are chosen.
And he's not just there talking only of
the unredeemed who'll be lost because they won't
embrace the grace of God and claim redemption
through the shed blood of our once crucified
but now risen Lord, he's talking about every
one of you and me, right here now.
I doubt whether there's one boy, girl, man
or woman in this building at this moment
whom he hasn't called, and yet so few
are chosen.
Why of the many do you think that
he calls are so few chosen among the
redeemed?
Because faithful is he that calleth you who
will also do it and so very many
of those whom he calls refuse to let
him do it.
And it isn't even that they don't want
it done but they insist on doing it
for him instead of letting him do it
through them.
And we talked about that yesterday for Abraham
had two sons and one was the byproduct
of his misguided dedication trying to do it
for God, born of the flesh, Ishmael, but
Isaac, born of promise.
So when God wants to say the biggest
thing he ever said, he looks for a
perfect heart, somebody who's prepared to let him
do it.
Remember the story?
Of course you do.
Luke's gospel in chapter one, let's glance at
it just for a few moments.
So familiar we need only glance at it,
the 26th verse of the first chapter of
Luke, in the sixth month the angel Gabriel
was sent from God under a city of
Galilee named Nazareth and he wasn't sent on
a general assignment.
Look around and see whom you can find
and make a recommendation.
Is that what God said?
Take a few angels with you and sit
in committee and come up with some suitable
candidates.
When God sent his angel Gabriel he gave
him the exact address.
He sent him to a virgin espoused to
a man whose name was Joseph, verse 27,
engaged to be married but not yet consummated
and said, Hail thou that art highly favored,
the Lord is with thee, blessed art thou
among women.
And the girl's name, probably no more than
a late teenager, was Mary.
But when she saw him, an angel, she
was troubled.
You don't see an angel every morning of
the week.
But angels are very kind, from all we
read of them in the Bible, he, seeing
that she was troubled, said, Don't be frightened,
Mary.
Verse 30, thou hast found favor with God.
And behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb.
Made this fantastic proposition.
For conception in the womb in itself is
a miracle because that isn't where conception takes
place.
That demanded a divine intervention.
Thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bring
forth a son, thou shalt call his name
Jesus, named a boy before he was born.
Were you named before you were born?
I mean, did your mom and dad send
a postcard round to all your friends and
relatives and say that on the 14th of
May, Horace will be born?
Or on the 23rd of June, Agatha?
No, because they wouldn't have stuck their necks
out that far because on the day, you
see, Horace might have turned out to be
Agatha and Agatha might have turned out to
be Horace.
You probably don't have the peculiar mind that
I have, but can you imagine just how
embarrassing it would have been for the angel
Gabriel, for Mary and Joseph and God himself
if on that first Christmas morning it had
turned out to be a girl?
But you see, God doesn't make that kind
of a mistake.
He whom thou shalt call Jesus shall be
great.
He shall be called the son of the
highest.
The Lord God shall give unto him the
throne of his father David and he shall
reign.
He'll reign over the house of Jacob forever
and of his kingdom of which there will
be no end.
He shall be king.
Well that was a pretty fantastic proposition.
Thou hast found favor with God.
Say what do you know about Mary before
this?
Where did she go to school?
What do you know about her mum and
dad?
What trade did he play?
What honors did she earn?
What grades with which she graduated?
Well you don't know a thing, not a
thing.
Save what is foreshadowed of her, unnamed in
the Old Testament, when God first made public
proclamation of the redemptive and regenerative purpose that
had been fashioned in the heart of God,
when man fell into sin rebuking Satan, he
said I'll put enmity between you and the
woman, between her seed and your seed and
it the seed of that woman, Jesus, to
be born of Mary.
He will bruise your head, he'll destroy you,
strike you a mortal blow, but in the
process you'll bruise his heel, he'll hang on
a Roman gallows, the seed of the woman.
We're told Isaiah chapter 7, I'll give you
a sign, God said, a virgin shall conceive
and bear a son.
You will call his name Immanuel, God with
us, the word incarnate, made flesh.
And in the ninth chapter, to Isaiah, a
child is given, a son is born.
His name's going to be called Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Wonderful Counselor, Prince of Peace.
And God added, the zeal of the Lord
of hosts will do this, it won't be
of any human explanation, it'll demand a divine
intervention.
And furthermore, I'll tell you exactly where he's
going to be born of that virgin girl.
Micah chapter 5, verse 2, out of thee,
Bethlehem Ephrata, shall he come forth, whose days
have been from eternity to eternity, because that's
where God lives.
Now that's all we know about Mary, foreshadowed
in the Old Testament in our office, but
still remaining unidentified and unnamed.
So when did she find favor?
Well, as a little girl growing up, for
the eyes of the Lord, run to and
fro throughout the whole earth, looking, looking, looking.
But all those little events in a girl's
life, that to us would have no significance
whatever, but God was watching, a state of
heart.
Not a human circumstance, not whether her mom
or dad were wealthy or not, not whether
they were brilliant, genius in their own right,
so that she might be brought up to
be unusually smart and successful, no, God wasn't
looking at that, he was looking at her
heart.
And again and again, in all kinds of
little ways, God was sort of writing in
his notebook.
Here's a little girl who knows who I
am, and is prepared to reckon with the
fact.
She's got a perfect heart.
She's longing again and again that she cannot,
but there's a God in heaven who can.
And nobody's noticed it, but I have, God
says, I've been looking, looking, looking.
That's how God chooses.
Those who are to be part of his
history, his friends, like Abraham.
And finally God said to the angel Gabriel,
there she is, knock on that door, her
name is Mary.
She's got a perfect heart.
Not sinless, but a disposition toward God that
is prepared to let God be God.
And nothing, nothing will surprise her.
Mary said to the angel, how shall this
be, seeing I know not a man?
Not incredulity, not cynicism.
She didn't try to laugh it off, otherwise
God never would have sent Gabriel to that
girl's home.
This was wide-eyed wonder.
You mean really what you say?
Well yes, said the angel.
But how?
How?
Oh, said the angel, if you want to
know how, it's very simple, Mary.
A simple principle that you've learned as a
little kid already to apply.
That's why God sent me to you.
You have found favor.
The Holy Spirit shall come upon you.
The power of the high shall overshadow you,
and therefore also that holy thing which shall
be born of you will be called God's
son.
That's how, Mary.
God.
Himself.
Oh, by the way, just for your encouragement,
may interest you to know that Elizabeth, your
cousin, who all her days has been barren,
physically incapable of bearing, and who now is
far, far too old to bear.
She's in the sixth month, and she, too,
is going to have a little boy.
And we know who that was going to
be, John the Baptist.
So said the angel, for the encouragement of
this teenage girl.
With Elizabeth it's too late, and with you
it's going to be too soon.
Because you see, with God, nothing, nothing, nothing,
Mary, is impossible, and God's chosen you because
you've already settled in your heart that you
can, that God can, if only you're prepared
to let him, and God knows that you
will.
And she did.
Mary said, behold the handmaid of the Lord,
which simply means I'm available.
I don't understand it, I couldn't explain it
to myself, and least of all could I
explain it to anybody else, and she didn't
even try, because once, having settled for the
issue, she hid these things in her heart,
she didn't blather all over the place and
tell everybody that she was going to be
the mother of God.
She kept her mouth shut.
The hardest thing in all the world for
most of us to do.
That in itself needs God, it's almost the
impossible.
If she had been exhorted today in the
popular, you know, trend of the age, she'd
have said, God, I get the message, I'll
do it, you leave it to me.
You couldn't have chosen a person more qualified
for the job.
And flexing her muscles and gritting her teeth,
she would demonstrate.
She could, and couldn't, and wouldn't.
Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it
unto me, from your direction to my direction,
having its initiation in the God of eternity.
Be it unto me according to your word.
In other words, said she, you said it.
You do it.
Today we're told that we're the ones who
say it, and God does it.
No, God said it.
And God did it.
But you know that that little boy might
be born at Bethlehem, the biggest thing God
ever said.
When the world heard that baby cry, that
he might come dead on schedule.
You see, the God of eternity had already
been laying the stage, as he always does.
As for those events in your life, into
which you're going to be caught out into
the timeless purpose of God, in the measure
of your availability to him, as was hers
to God in that day.
He's already laying the foundations.
All kinds of things are happening that you
know nothing of.
Conversations taking place.
Telephone calls are being made.
Letters are being written.
People are being born, and others are dying.
So that at the precise moment, dead on
schedule, he may accomplish those things through your
life and mine, for which we have been
first created, now redeemed and indwelt by our
risen Lord.
Because we have been recreated in Christ unto
future good works, a program that God has
before ordained that we should walk in.
That isn't sort of pagan fatalism.
Because the story can and will only be
told in the measure of your availability and
mine.
I've come, said the Lord Jesus, to do
your will, O God.
Hebrews 10 and verse 7.
All that has been written of me in
the volume of the book.
What book?
The Old Testament scriptures that foreshadowed his birth,
life, death, and resurrection.
But in his total availability to the Father,
he could, at the end of his days,
cry and triumph, finished!
Mission accomplished!
The story, Father, has been told.
And your ambition and mine is that at
the end of our days, we will have
hindered him as little as possible in the
story he wrote for you and wrote for
me.
No issues for him to face.
No decisions for him to make.
That's why all he demands of us is
a disposition, a state of heart that lets
God do it.
All right, turn back now to the first
book of Samuel in chapter 16.
Remember, the Bible is a total revelation of
an eternal plan that was fashioned in the
heart of God.
Sixteenth chapter, first book of Samuel.
The Lord said to Samuel, How long wilt
thou mourn for Saul, seeing I have rejected
him from reigning over Israel?
Said God to Samuel, Wipe away your tears
and don't waste your pity.
He's a dead loss!
I have rejected him.
Fill thine horn with oil.
Go, I'll send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite,
for I have provided me a king among
his sons.
Go to Bethlehem.
There there's a man called Jesse.
He's got a whole bunch of kids and
amongst his sons.
God said, I've got a king.
I've got a king.
Well, Samuel didn't take too kindly to the
instructions.
He says, How can I go?
Verse 2, If Saul hear it, he's still
on the throne.
He reigns.
He calls the shots.
If he hears this, he'll kill me.
And God said, Tell him you're going to
church.
And take a heifer with you.
Aren't you glad you don't have to take
a heifer with you when you go to
church?
I mean, think of the spring conference at
Prairie Bible Institute.
You wouldn't just need a parking lot.
You'd need a feed lot.
You wouldn't hear the speaker for the mooing.
Sometimes that might be an improvement.
But the Lord said, Take a heifer with
thee.
And tell him I've come to sacrifice to
the Lord.
And thou shalt anoint unto me.
Verse 3, Notice that him whom I name.
I name.
I'm not asking for your advice.
I name.
And Samuel did a very smart thing.
He did that which the Lord spake.
That's always the smartest thing you can do.
Because when you're told what to do and
do as you're told, something's going to happen.
Of timeless worth.
Mind you, the elders went too enthusiastic.
Either they trembled at his coming.
Most folks are a little nervous when the
pastor calls.
They said, Have you come peaceably?
He said, Yes, peaceably.
I'm going to church and I want to
take Jesse and his kids with me.
And so they're all prepared and off they
went.
Came to pass when they were come.
Verse 6, He looked on Eliab and he
said, Surely the Lord's anointed is before him.
Because Eliab, he was a he-man.
He was an all-American.
He had hairs on his chest like barbed
wire.
You know, his muscles were like elephant's kneecaps.
He had a chin like the Brouwer battleship.
And Samuel understandably thought, Man, if ever there
was a king, there he is, head and
shoulders above the rest.
Fantastic.
And God said, Forget it.
Look not on his countenance or on the
height of his stature.
I'm not impressed.
This isn't a fat stock show.
I have refused him.
For man looketh on the outward appearance, but
the Lord looketh on the heart.
I'm not evaluating how impressive he is.
You know, he enters a room and everybody
stops talking and looks in his direction.
And the girls, of course, they all flutter
around like little bits of fluff.
God says, I'm not impressed.
Whoever may be.
I have refused him.
Because I'm looking on the heart.
So Jesse called Abinadab and God said, Uh
-uh.
And then he called Shammah the third and
God said, Uh-uh.
Seven times God said, Uh-uh.
It was the sevenfold, Uh-uh.
And that was a little embarrassing for Samuel,
you see, because there were no more.
And Samuel said, Are here all your children?
And Jesse said, No, there remaineth yet the
youngest, but he's only just a little kid.
We left him behind on the hill to
keep the sheep.
We didn't think it was worthwhile bringing him.
And Samuel said, Send and fetch him, for
we will not sit down till he cometh
hither.
Now you might imagine that because God said
no to Eli, that fine specimen of humanity,
that the uglier you are, the bigger chance
you have.
You're right in the front line.
You know, the more nauseatingly unpleasant.
The chances are you'll be God's first choice.
You know, like the young man who took
his mother-in-law with him on his
honeymoon because she was so ugly he didn't
want to kiss her goodbye.
They went to the seashore and she sat
on the sand and watched out over the
ocean, sat there several hours and finally the
beach attendant came and said, Excuse me, madam,
would you go home?
The tide wants to come in.
He took her to the shopping center and
dropped her there and was arrested by the
police 50 yards down the road for leaving
the scene of an accident.
Now you know, you know just how ugly
she must have been and you might have
thought, Boys, she's the one God's going to
choose.
But that isn't true.
For David came, verse 12, and he was
ruddy, with all of the beautiful countenance and
goodly to look to.
And God said, I've got a king.
I've got a king.
Arise, anoint him, this is he.
What do you know about David before this?
Nothing.
This is your first introduction to a small
shepherd boy brought somewhat reluctantly by his dad.
And God said, I've got a king.
Because, you see, the eyes of the Lord
run to and fro throughout the whole earth
that he, God, might show himself strong on
the behalf of them whose hearts are perfect
toward him.
So when did God choose him?
For the perfect heart.
Let's look over the page, we only have
just a few moments.
The Philistines, verse 3 of chapter 17, stood
on a mountain on the one side and
Israel stood on a mountain on the other
side.
And there was a valley between them and
there went out a champion, Goliath, the giant.
Nine foot six tall.
And the Philistines said, verse 10, I defy
the armies of Israel this day.
Give me a man that we may fight
together.
But in all the armies of Israel, there
was no man.
Just a bunch of frightened sheep.
Because it says in verse 24, all the
quotes, men, end of quotes, of Israel, when
they saw the man, fled from him.
They were so afraid.
And they said to one to the other,
have you seen this man that has come
up?
Surely to defy Israel has he come up?
It shall be that the man who kills
him, the king will enrich him with great
riches.
He'll give him his daughter and make his
father's house free in Israel.
Why don't you go?
Well, why don't you go?
And they were amazed that nobody else would
go.
Because none of them had the guts.
But just about that time, David's dad sent
him with some cookies for his three older
brothers who had been drafted.
And some cheeses for their captain.
And when he was there, he heard these
men of war discussing the giant.
So grabbing the leg of one of them,
he said, verse 26, what shall be done
to the man that killeth this Philistine and
taketh away the reproach from Israel?
Who is this uncircumcised Philistine anyway that he
should defy the armies of the living God?
I'll take care of him.
And if you were to read on the
next few verses, you'd see what was the
natural reaction of his three older brothers.
They said, go home, big mouth.
Get back to your sheep.
That's what big brothers are for.
Just to persecute little brothers.
And keep their feet on them.
But news spread.
When the words were heard, verse 31, which
David spake, they rehearsed them before Saul.
And he sent for him, and David said
to King Saul, let no man's heart fail
because of him.
Thy servant will go and fight with the
Philistine.
And Saul said to David, thou art not
able to go against this Philistine to fight
with him.
Thou art but a youth.
He was a man of war from his
youth.
You don't have what it takes.
And David said to the king, I've got
news for you.
Thy servant David kept his father's sheep, and
there came a lion and a bear.
And they took a lamb out of the
flock.
Mind you, King Saul, when I saw that
lion, man, he looked big.
Did he look big.
And when he opened his mouth and roared,
those teeth.
But you know, King Saul, after I'd looked
at the lion, I looked at God.
And then the lion looked so small, so
I killed him.
And you know, then came the bear, King
Saul.
And you know, that bear learned nothing from
the lion.
Mind you, I'm not saying he didn't look
big.
Man, did he look big.
Then I looked at God, and then that
bear looked so small.
So I went out after him, verse 35,
he said, and I smote him.
I delivered it out of his mouth, and
when he arose against me, I caught him
by his beard, and smote him, and slew
him.
Thy servant slew both the lion and the
bear.
And I'll tell you something, King Saul, as
for this uncircumcised Philistine, he shall be one
of them, seeing he hath defied the armies
of the living God.
But, said David to King Saul, I don't
want you to misunderstand me.
It's the Lord that delivered me out of
the port of the lion.
It's that mighty God who delivered me out
of the port of the bear.
And it's that same mighty God who will
deliver me out of the hand of this
Philistine.
I want you to understand, King Saul, I
don't have what it takes.
But God does.
And Saul said, go.
And the Lord be with thee.
And I think underneath his breath, he said,
you'll need him.
But David had already discovered whom he needed.
He'd got a perfect heart.
He knew that God was standing tiptoe to
show himself strong.
On the behalf of any boy, girl, man,
or woman who's prepared to say, I cannot.
But God can.
And I'm prepared to let him.
He took his staff and his hand.
In verse 40, chose him five smooth stones
out of the brook.
His sling was in his hand and the
Philistine came on.
He disdained him, said, verse 43, am I
a dog that thou comest to me with
staves?
And curse David.
And David said, verse 45, thou comest to
me with a sword and with a spear
and with a shield.
I come to thee in the name of
the Lord of hosts, the God of the
armies of Israel, whom you have defied.
Mr. Goliath, you're in trouble.
Because you're not going to fight me.
You're going to fight him.
This day will the Lord deliver thee into
my hand.
That all the earth may know, end of
verse 46.
That God's got a champion on earth.
That at last he's found somebody on earth
big enough to keep God in business.
Is that what he said?
That all the earth may know that there's
a God in Israel.
A God that Israel has forgotten.
And all this assembly shall know that the
Lord saveth not with the sword and spear,
for the battle is the Lord's.
That is what Jehoshaphat had to rediscover.
Something that had been discovered by his great,
great, great grandfather, David.
He will give you into our hands.
And David hasted, ran toward the army to
meet the Philistine.
David put his hand in his bag, slain.
And so David, with a sling, prevailed over
the Philistine.
He smote him and slew him.
But there was no sword in the hand
of David.
Just a mighty God in heaven.
And a state of heart in a small
boy on earth.
One of God's friends.
With a perfect heart.
So that nearly 2,000 years ago the
world could hear a baby cry.
Biggest thing God ever said.
Of the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and of
Jacob.
The twister, the sneak, the swindler whose name
God changed when God found his heart.
To Israel.
A prince with God.
That he bearing 12 sons, that of the
tribe of Judah and of the house of
David.
In the city of David.
Bethlehem.
Conceived miraculously by the Holy Ghost in the
borrowed womb of a virgin girl.
He might come forth.
In whom all the fams of the earth
should be blessed.
Dead on schedule.
In the eternal timeless purpose of a God
who knows the end from the beginning.
And whose eyes run to and fro throughout
the whole earth.
That here or there he might find some
boy, some girl, some man or woman.
Who willing to let God be God.
Show himself strong on their behalf.
Might be the means on earth of his
divine ends.
God's friends.
Part of God's history.
And you see before our Lord Jesus comes
so much sooner than we would dare to
believe.
He still has a little business to transcend.
And his eyes still today.
Are running to and fro.
Throughout the whole earth.
Through every row in this building right now.
And he's not particularly interested how well you're
dressed.
How much money you got in the bank.
He doesn't want negligence.
Nor slovenliness.
Of course.
Because that outward sign might be an evidence
of the state of heart within.
But where he primarily looks.
Is on the inside.
Looking for the perfect heart that says Lord
Jesus.
I'm just a little kid.
They only trusted me with a bunch of
sheep.
But I realize now that all that matters
is not how big I am.
But how big you are.
And I want you to know that all
that I am.
Is available to all that you are.
And I know that you're never.
Ever.
Less than big enough.
You're a God who's bigger than bears.
Bigger than lions.
And bigger than giants.
Any candidates?
Let's pray.
Thank you dear Lord for the.
Incredible opportunity that you've given to us as
the creature to live daily in the power
of the Creator.
To know at all times that we're but
the earthen vessel.
That you're.
The timeless treasure.
That the excellency and the power may be
at all times.
Be demonstrably.
Of God.
The God.
Who can.
There are some of us Lord Jesus this
morning.
Boy, girl, man or woman.
Whoever we may be who would humbly say
in our hearts.
I don't deserve it.
You never.
Said I did.
But you made me this way.
You created me in such a way so
engineered that the presence of the Creator.
Within the creatures indispensable to my humanity.
But all you're looking for in me is
normality.
That normality that lifts me up and out
of the animal kingdom.
By a quality of life and behavior that
will know no possible explanation.
But you Lord Jesus living in my heart.
God in the man.
I want to be that boy.
Whom you can choose.
I want to be that girl.
I want to be that man.
I want to be that woman.
I want to hinder you as little as
possible in the telling of the story that
you've already written.
I want as best I know how at
the end of my days to cry it's
finished.
Mission accomplished.
I simply let God be God.
And he was big enough for the job.
Thank you.
In your own dear and precious name.
Amen.
You've been listening to a sermon by Major
Ian Thomas.
If you've been blessed by this sermon you
can find more sermons by him.
And additional resources on this subject at www
.PathToPrayer.com Again, if you've been blessed by
this sermon you can find more sermons by
Major Ian Thomas at www.PathToPrayer.com as
well as other resources.