August 7, 2011
Scripture:
Turn back for a brief moment to Isaiah 53:7: “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.” We were reminded earlier of how Abel offered a lamb to God for sin; this continued throughout the history of Israel. Then the Lord came; why is He pictured as a lamb, and not a bull or an ox? When you kill a lamb, it will not make a sound; when the Lord was before Pilate, he was silent, for the most part. He “he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross” (Philippians 2:8). He has the character of a lamb.
We read in Revelation 5 earlier. What was in the center of the throne? A slain lamb. When we get to glory, we will always be reminded of the Lamb who died for us. We saw how He should be “your lamb”: each person in the world should know the Lord.
After the rapture and tribulation, the Lord will return to earth, but not as a lamb. He will reign over the earth as a lion. But we will still see Him as the lamb in glory. We will be singing a new song to the One who died for us on Calvary. May we find joy and happiness in the One who is God’s own Lamb.
Hymn 312- Jesus loves me, this I know
Prayer
1 Samuel 27
Today we are going to continue in 1 Samuel. Last time, Saul had been chasing David. David had gone into Saul’s camp and taken some of Saul’s things. After that, Saul realized that David had had the chance to kill him, but didn’t. Then Saul saw that he shouldn’t try to kill David.
I’m sure we’ve all played tag. When you are tired, you can go to homebase or “T” and catch your breath. Well, David went to Philistia to “catch his breath.” He felt that, sooner or later, Saul was going to get him. We read that David went to the King of Gath. Do you remember who was from Gath? Goliath was; that means that David was in enemy territory. David was afraid of Saul, but he should have remembered that God had taken care of him all this time; he didn’t need to flee to enemy land. For us the Lord has said, “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee” (Hebrews 13:5). We can see that the Lord protected David time and again, but David didn’t seem to have much faith at this time. Well, when Saul heard that David was in Gath, he stopped trying to find David.
David stayed in Gath for one year and four months; for that time, Achish—King of the Philistines— gave him the city of Ziklag as a home for him and his men. This is quite different from the last time David went to Gath, when they caught him and brought him before Achish. When before Achish, David acted mad so that Achish didn’t want him around.
One day, David and his men went out and captured a city. They killed all the people in the city so that they could not tell anybody what they had done. On the way home, they ran into Achish; he asked where they had been. David didn’t tell him the truth: he told Achish that they had fought a city in Judah. He made Achish believe that he had killed his own people. From that, Achish believed that David would be his servant for many years.
David had gone into enemy territory and then lied to Achish. Both of those things were out of his normal character and wrong. May we each believe that the Lord will never leave us nor forsake us.
Luke 6:27-49
This whole discourse is from the mouth of our Lord. He gave the blessings and woes to the apostles and now He gives them some instructions.
All of these instructions are contrary to our natural man, especially things like “love your enemies”. What we have to remember is that we were the Lord’s enemies, yet He loved us. There is something in us that wants to get back at people for wronging us; but Romans tells us that if we love them instead, it’s like heaping coals of fire on their head. Our kindness will have a profound effect, but it’s not possible if we’re not in a right spirit with the Lord. On the cross He could pray “Father forgive them; for they know not what they do.” These instructions are really the institution of grace; and it appears that the harder it is to love our enemies, the more grace God will give us to do it. God certainly gives (and gave) grace to the martyrs and missionaries who go through great trials. The Lord was sending the disciples out to preach and knew that they would face people who would abuse and ridicule them. But instead of retaliating, Jesus told the disciples to pray for these people.
V29. There was a man by the name of Richard Weaver who was a rough coal miner; but he got saved and became much more gentle. Now, the other miners that Richard Weaver worked with often fought. One day Richard came home with marks on both his cheeks and his wife asked him, “Richard, have you been in a fight?”
“Oh,” Richard replied, “I’ve had a great victory! I let him hit me on both cheeks.”
The apostle Paul could tell similar stories. Think of the Philippian jailer. Paul didn’t want to get back at him for all that he’d done to them, but rather he wanted to give him the gospel.
This all comes down to v30, which is known as the golden rule. Some people think that if they keep the golden rule, they will go to Heaven. That’s not the case at all; this isn’t a salvation verse, it’s a verse about practical living. Jesus told the disciples, “It’s easy to love those who love you”, but it’s hard to love those who hate you. That goes beyond what our natural heart can accomplish.
The subject of lending is always an exercise. We’re supposed to lend, and not expect anything back. This doesn’t mean that we should always lend; we must ask, “Is this the Lord’s will? All that I have is His, I’m just a steward.” Once our brother Norman lent a ladder to a house repairman because he needed it for some work at another house. Some time went by and the ladder wasn’t returned. One day our brother was talking to this man and his assistant and asked, “Where’s my ladder?”
“I don’t know,” the man replied.
“I do. It’s right down here.” The assistant said.
“Is it? Okay, get it then,” said the repairman.
Later, our brother found out that this repair man had also borrowed a ladder from the doctor across the street, and had never returned it. It’s not natural to lend without expecting anything back, but it’s commanded here. Just recently, our brother Norman’s house in Rockway was broken into, and a local unbeliever asked him, “Aren’t you going to call the police?”. Our brother didn’t, because taking legal action might ruin a chance to reach out to those people in the future. We need to be imitators of the God-head, and we can do that by following the commands given in this passage.
V36. Jesus was training the disciples to go out and be like Himself. Are we disciples? Are we learning?
V37. As followers of the Lord, we have responsibilities. One of those might have to be judging assembly matters; but if we have to, we must be very careful. We might see the faults in another person, but we must remember that we have a mote in our own eye. When we see those faults we should ask, “What about me? What faults do I have to deal with?”
V35. tells us that God loves a generous person. We told the story last week of the man who didn’t give because he had much, but had much because he gave. If we are generous we, too, will be overflowing with blessings.
Jesus then told the story of the blind leading the blind. If we are leaders we must ask ourselves, “Do I have light?”. If we are a follower we need to be asking, “Does my leader have light?”. One wonders how many pastors and leaders are out there that aren’t even the Lord’s. It’s a solemn thought to have followers and not be teaching them the truth.
This isn’t the most uplifting passage, but there is a lot of instruction here for us.
Hymn 366 - We are little children, very young indeed
Prayer