Ron Gannon - David the Man - David the King

[0:00] And first, let's have a word of prayer. Does anybody have any prayer requests? I see Holly is back, so evidently her rehab is doing good since she's out about.

[0:12] I don't know if she's driving yet, but no. Well, you've got a sister that can do that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay, let's have a word of prayer then.

[0:23] Father, we just thank you. Father, we thank you for who and for what you are and for your love and grace. Father, we just don't understand it. We don't deserve it, but we thank you for it.

[0:35] And Father, we just pray this morning that you'll guide us as we go through your word here studying about the kings and David. And Father, just bless us as we do it.

[0:45] So Father, we thank you now. We praise you. We ask it in the Lord and Savior's name, Jesus the Christ. Amen. Okay. Well, we begin, last week we started a study on David, the man, and David, the king.

[1:03] And there is two completely different stories there. Because as we get into 1 Samuel, we're going to see David, the man.

[1:14] And what he's like and what he did with all the things that was going on in his life. And there's all kinds of things that's in those two books, 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel, when we're talking about the kings.

[1:29] Last week, before we got started, I said, before I wanted to get into that part of the story, there was things I needed to talk about from the history to get people up to the speed of why we needed a king.

[1:43] Why we even needed it to begin with. And that's what we did last week. I'll be continuing that this week. And where we left off last week was with Joshua. And Joshua took over after Moses, after coming through the Exodus.

[2:00] And some of the orders that were left for Moses and he gave to Joshua was, when you go into this land, Cana, which God has given you, don't mess around.

[2:12] When you take those cities, completely destroy them. And when we talk about destroy, we're talking about man, woman, child, animals, everything. Destroy.

[2:24] Because the Canaanites and all the ites are so far from God with all their false idols, all the type of sacrifice that they do, that we don't want you involved in that.

[2:35] So when you go in, destroy everything. And as we see, as Joshua unfolded, they did. They went in and they started taking their cities and started doing all the things that God wanted them to do.

[2:52] And they were taking over a part of the land of Cana. But as we ended up with Joshua, we saw that they didn't do everything. And they were falling back because what?

[3:03] They started intermarrying. They didn't kill all the people. They didn't kill all the animals. And that lifestyle just gradually takes over where you get further and further from God, who has instructed him through Moses and through Joshua.

[3:22] So as we ended up with Joshua, now we're going to start the book of Judges. So before Joshua's death, there was still land to be conquered.

[3:33] They hadn't conquered all the land because of them falling back. So the start of Judges through the land had been generally conquered and occupied under Joshua.

[3:43] Many important Canaanite strongholds had been bypassed, leaving their conquering to individual Israelite tribes. So it was a slow process.

[3:54] They did a good job at the beginning, but now it was getting slow. So the book of Judges, let's turn to the book of Judges and we'll go to chapter 2. The book of Judges destroyed this warfare as the Hebrews tried to complete their occupation of the land.

[4:09] These judges were military and civilian leaders ruling during this time. Some of the judges ruled concurrently with each other and not necessarily rule over the entire land.

[4:21] So if we turn to Judges, let's turn to Judges chapter 2, verse 10. And it says there, All that generation also were gathered to their fathers.

[4:41] And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord, nor yet the work which he had done for Israel. Then the sons of Israel did evil on the side of the Lord and served the Baals or other gods.

[4:55] And jump down to verse 16. Then the Lord raised up judges to deliver them from the hands of those who plundered them. Yet they did not listen to their judges, for they played the harlot after other gods and bowed themselves down to them.

[5:11] They turned aside quickly from the way in which their fathers had walked in obeying the commandments of the Lord. They did not do as their fathers. When the Lord raised up judges for them, the Lord was with the judge and delivered them from the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge.

[5:30] For the Lord was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who oppressed and affected them. But it came about when the judges died that they would return back and act more correctly than their fathers in following other gods to serve them and bow down to them that they did not abandon their practices of their stubborn ways.

[5:54] So we see here, if you go all the way through the book of Judges, how many judges would we have? We had 12 judges during a 350 year span, I believe.

[6:04] 12 judges. God raised them up. He brought a judge up, raised him up. Your people are complaining. Go out and conquer the land for them.

[6:17] Take care of this. That judge would come in. They had military behind them. They would go out and they would conquer 30 years of peace. 40 years of peace.

[6:29] Each one of these judges served anywhere from 30 to 40 years. And they had this. But as the years went through, maybe it was a 20 year span.

[6:40] We don't know what time of span it was. But they started, what? Worshipping again. Other gods. Marrying other people from the Canaanites or whatever the ites they went to.

[6:52] And again, they failed. Judge. God would send another judge. Judge. That judge would do the same thing. He would bring his military in. He would capture.

[7:03] They would have peace again for another 40 years. That's the way the whole book of judges goes. And I'm not going to go through each one of those judges because it's a lot to go through. It's pretty much the same thing.

[7:15] You're going to be reading God appointed him as judge. Now there was one woman that was a judge. And that was Deborah. So I think she ruled for 40 years also.

[7:27] But the same thing. So we're not going to go through all the judges. We are going to go through a couple. And I think probably the most recognizable ones of the judges would be Gideon and Samson.

[7:43] So we're going to look just a little bit about that. And Gideon, God chose Gideon to be a judge. And Gideon said, why would you choose me?

[7:53] I'm from this tribe. My family has no status. None of these things. Why would you choose me, God? Or the Lord or whoever came to speak to him. It was probably an angel.

[8:05] But he said, God has chosen you to lead the people from these Moabites. And that's what God wants you to do. And what did Gideon want to do when God was talking to him?

[8:22] He didn't believe him. He said, God, I've got to have a sign. Why would you choose me? Give me some kind of a sign that I would realize that you're going to make me this great leader that you're talking about.

[8:33] And, of course, he asked for a sign. The first one was from the offering that he made. And the fire came on and burnt the meat. And they had the offerings. God said, now, that altar was built from the people who were worshipping other gods.

[8:49] Tear that altar down. Build me a new altar. And he did that. Then he started gathering the people around. And they started coming to him. And he gained a leading of 32,000 soldiers.

[9:01] So now he had the military manpower to go out and to capture the people that they would be fighting. But he still wasn't satisfied.

[9:16] Is God still going to use me? And then we came to the area where he said, God, I'm going to put this fleece out. Do the miracle there. God did.

[9:27] And he made do. I don't know which one it was. Whether it was due on the fleece or due on the ground. But he did one of those. And he said, okay. He said, now, let's do it the opposite way.

[9:40] So he did it the opposite way. And the same came. And finally, old Gideon realized, you know, God is, he is going to use me. I've got 32,000 men.

[9:52] I can go and I can conquer these people. I think he had the idea that I'm strong now and I can do this. But what did God tell him? He said, Gideon, you've got way too many men here.

[10:06] Cut that down to 300 men. I want you to cut it down. Because you're dependent too much on yourself. You're not depending on God.

[10:17] And that's what he told him to do. So he took those, his soldiers and he cut them down to 300 men. And then we talk about the battle that he went to.

[10:28] And God came to him and said, go down to the enemy camp. Take somebody with you. Go down to the Indian, Gideon camp and just listen. Don't do anything.

[10:40] Listen. And they snuck down and they heard him giving a dream. And, well, I don't know what the dream was right now. But anyway, the dream, another guy interpreted for the guy and he said, this is talking about Gideon and the Israelites.

[10:57] And they're probably going to come and fight us and capture us. And it scared them. Now Gideon, the man said, okay, now we know it's ready. And they went back to the camp.

[11:08] And he even took more men from them. And they went down. And all they had to do, they didn't take their weapons with them. They didn't have to. God said, go down with bottles.

[11:22] And when you get down there and everybody gets positioned around the camp, just shout. And when they shouted, they broke the bottles. And this whole camp of enemy just went hysteric.

[11:35] They went crazy. They started killing themselves. So this pointed out to the fact that God uses people. This was not Gideon that did this. This was God that led this judge and took care of it.

[11:49] And at the end of this, what we see is the people said, we want you to be our king. Lead us.

[12:01] But Gideon said, no. This is God's opportunity. We're going to leave it to God. So Gideon did not take that. And he just went on.

[12:11] And now, of course, later on, another 40 years passed or however many years passed. Again, they fell back in. They did the same thing. So now we're going to get to Samson.

[12:27] Now, Samson was a special case. Samson is unique among the judges in that he does not have armies but rather acts on his own using superhuman strength which God has given him.

[12:40] But he is also unlike a favor for his people. So despite being bond by a Nazarite vow, his mother was without child also.

[12:53] And she dedicated him when he was born as a Nazarite. And as a Nazarite, one of the things was you never took a razor to their head. And, of course, Samson had this beautiful long hair.

[13:07] And we're going to read the story. We're going to see what Samson done. He goes out and he kills all the Philistines. He does it many different ways. He becomes a hero because of all the Philistines that he's killed.

[13:21] Nevertheless, God uses him through exciting personal exploits to harass and destroy thousands of Philistines. Unfortunately, because of his weakness for pagan women, Samson's life will come to a tragic end.

[13:38] This indiscretion led to blindness, imprisonment, and pireness. Even worse, the Holy Spirit departed from Samson. Samson was a man of unmatched physical strength.

[13:50] But when he fell in love with a woman named Delilah, he met his match. And, of course, we know the story of Delilah and Gideon and what happened there.

[14:00] She tried many ways for him to get to tell her the things, the secrets that was going on, that they could come in and take care of the Philistines or try to get him to say what was going to happen so the Philistines would be ready for it when it did happen.

[14:16] So, this indiscretion led to blindness, imprisonment, and impireness. Even worse, the Holy Spirit departed from Samuel.

[14:28] So, the story of Samson and Delilah parallels the spiritual and political disarray of the nation of Israel at the time. Although Samson was physically strong, he was mortally weak.

[14:39] But God used his failures and mistakes to demonstrate his sovereign power. Speaking spiritually, Samson lost sight of his calling from God and gave up his greatest gift, his incredible physical strength.

[14:55] But we know God used him at the end. Because after years of imprisonment, he gave him his strength back to destroy the tower, the temple, or whatever it was that they had him chained to.

[15:09] So, no matter how far for a life left and for us, no matter how far you've fallen away from God, no matter how big you've failed, it's never too late to humble yourself before God.

[15:22] And God will use you just like he used Samson. So, judges ruled Israel for a period of time that most scholars say is about 350 years.

[15:34] Now, Samuel emerged as the last judge to lead the nation. The judges contended that Samuel was made, not Samuel, but Saul was made king, which ended the line of the judges.

[15:48] So, what we got, we got the time now that they had a theocracy type of government because God was in control. And now they're going to be going to a minority, manarchy, which is ruled by a king.

[16:05] And things are going to change. And we're going to see that as we go through. But first here, judges were appointed by God in response to prayers of Israel from the death of Joshua through Samuel.

[16:19] During this time, God was the king of Israel. A judge was called by God for a specific mission and then served during their lifetime in a leading role in Israel.

[16:31] Judgeship was not inherited by their offspring. And that's going to be a difference that we're going to see. You know, a judge came on board, he ruled, and then he died.

[16:46] And they may have been in safety at that time. But then they fell back and God said, Now I've got to choose another judge. And God would choose.

[16:56] And remember, God chose the judge. So, a king was appointed at the appeal of the people and his offsprings were the kings after him. So, this is a big difference. Following the traditions of the other people around Israel, Israel wanted a king and all the kings were male.

[17:16] Once the king was appointed, no more judges were appointed. Saul was the first king. God took the kingship away from Saul because of Saul's disobedience.

[17:27] And then we're going to see where David comes in. A masked man to serve solely as a judge was Samson. And he only began to break Israel out of the oppression.

[17:39] His efforts against the Philistines paved the way for this book namesake Samuel. And Samuel and Samson may have been alive at the same time. It doesn't say that, but it's a good possibility that they were alive at the same time.

[17:54] So, now we get through the book of Judges. Let's turn to the book of Samuel. And as you can see, I'm not spending a lot of time here. I don't intend to spend a lot of time in the books that we just talked about as far as Joshua and the book of Judges.

[18:10] Just to give some history about leading up to where we have a new king. And now we're going to get into Samuel. You've already noticed, and we're going to notice it more.

[18:25] When you start seeing names, names of cities, I'm not good at that. All right? I'm not good at all. So, you're probably going to see or hear some strange things come out of my mouth.

[18:39] Because I look at that word, I see something that I know I'm not pronouncing right. And so, just know that up front. So, if you're reading it, you're going to see it, and you can call it whatever you want to call it.

[18:52] And I'm sure, if you took three of us, we're going to come up with three different answers to what that word says. So, that's one of my failures. I have trouble pronouncing the words that I see there because they're just too difficult for me.

[19:10] So, 1 Samuel. With the period of judges coming to a close, the intention now focuses upon a person of a uniting status. Born in response to his barren mother's prayers, Samuel was the last Israel judge, one of its many prophets, and the anointer of the first king.

[19:29] The story begins with the story of Samuel's mother, Hannah. And like the mothers of several significant men in the history of Israel, Hannah was barren and could not have children until the Lord blessed her with a son.

[19:44] And that son was met to change the course of Israel's history. Hannah's husband was Elikai. He lived in the hill country. He had two wives.

[19:55] And he may have married the second wife, Piana, because of Hannah's infertility. We talk about that, you know. He had two wives.

[20:07] And that's not uncommon. Although, if we follow what God said back in Exodus, that was not his plan for two wives.

[20:17] His plan was, in Genesis 2.25, that for that reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one.

[20:30] They shall become one. And that's the way God had planned it. But through the history of people, of cultures, all the things that change him, God did put forth in the commandments that he gave Moses several times where he said, if something happens, a man can take two wives.

[20:55] And there were several different reasons why that may happen. One of them may be if the woman was barren and could not have children, then it's possible that the husband could take another wife.

[21:07] And we've seen that throughout history. We've seen it well with Abraham. Abraham was the story of that. Abraham and his wife could not have children.

[21:20] So, she gave him a concubine. Gave him to Abraham. And we're going to see that this is usually what happens when there's two wives involved. What happens? Ooh.

[21:33] Yeah. And that's exactly what happened here with Hannah. Because she would go, they would go into the, once a year where they go to the temple to give sacrifices.

[21:47] The husband would give a portion to the second wife and he would give a double portion to Hannah. Because Hannah was the one that he loved. And I don't understand how that culture worked.

[21:59] But that's the way it worked at that time. And, but since she did that, then the other wife would take jabs at her. And there was always that conflict going on.

[22:10] So, every year they travel to Shiloh for the temple. One year, though, Hannah refused to eat and goes to the temple to pray. Despite deeply distress, she weeps and pours her heart out to the Lord.

[22:22] She makes a vow to the Lord to give a son to him for a lifetime of service. If he will allow Hannah to conceive and give birth to that son. She includes in that vow that no razor will ever touch his head.

[22:37] Suggesting that this is a Nazarite vow. And we see the Nazarite vow back in the numbers, how that all went. And right now I'm reading from 1 Samuel 3 through 11.

[22:51] And now 12 through 16. Hannah is overwhelmed with emotion that she catches the attention of the priest of the temple. And the priest's name was Eli. Eli watches as Hannah lips move in a prayer, but no sounds come out.

[23:05] He thinks that she might be drunk. But Hannah convinces him that she's not drunk. She has been praying to God out of her deep anger and worry.

[23:15] And we see that in verses 12 through 16. Eli sees that she's telling the truth. He blesses Hannah. He affirms her prayer and possibly even prophesizes that God will grant her petition.

[23:27] And Hannah leaves the temple and no longer said, no longer said. After worshiping, Hannah and the rest of the family return home.

[23:38] 1 Samuel 17 through 20. We see that story. As Samuel is weaned, they take large sacrifices to the temple in Shiloh, including all the things that you would take for the sacrifices.

[23:50] Hannah presents Samuel to Eli and tells the priest, this is the day that she was praying for on the night of the other encounter.

[24:01] She tells Eli that she has given the boy over to the Lord for as long as he lives. This is quite a story.

[24:12] I mean, you're willing to take your son and turn him over to somebody else for the rest of his life. And this is how Hannah, in her prayers, that God answered her, she said, take this son and use him for the rest of his life.

[24:33] Did God bless her because of that? If you read further on, Hannah did have other children. So he did bless her for what she was doing there.

[24:48] Turn to chapter 2 now. Verses 18 to 21. Here we see now Samuel has been growing. He is now younger.

[25:01] Samuel is carrying out his duties and ministering before the Lord as a growing boy. Every year Hannah makes a new priestly robe for him and brings it to him. When they come for their annual sacrifice.

[25:13] So every year the family come up to the temple, not only to sacrifice, but to see their son. And we see that going for a long time.

[25:24] But the rest of the chapter 2 now, we're done talking about Hannah and the way that she received her son and the way that she turned that son over to God, to Eli.

[25:35] The rest of the chapter reports about the weakness of Eli's sons, the Lord's judgment there in 2 Samuel 2.12, and the Lord's judgment of their family for abusing their power as priests over Israel.

[25:49] Israel's, Eli's boys, Halopy and Phinesh, are simply corrupt men who won't know the Lord God.

[26:01] They're in 2 Samuel 2.12. And these men were his sons. They had a part of the ruling. And contrary to the law, Moses, Eli's sons demanded that choicest cuts of the meat for themselves, for those bringing animals to the sacrifice of the sanctuary.

[26:20] If the people who will not give it, they were threatened to take the meat away by force. They do all this before the animal was offered to the Lord. So these men had the opportunity to take advantage of the people who was coming to sacrifice before God.

[26:37] And God was going to deal with them. And he was going to deal with them through Samuel, through a dream. And we're going to see that next. Because Eli and his sons have done this, the Lord will drain the strength from Eli and his descendants, even while the rest of Israel prospers.

[26:56] Eli's success will die young. His family line will forever be cursed with permanent death. Yet Eli will live to an old age simply so he can mourn immediate deaths of his family.

[27:09] And we're going to see that as we move on. So the sign from the Lord that he's going to give Samuel. The sign of the Lord providing these long-term predictions will happen that Eli's two sons will die on the same day.

[27:25] And we're going to see that unfold. As Samuel continues to grow, the Lord is so clear. 1 Samuel 5 and 7. Chapters 5 through 7. We're going to see that Samuel continues to grow.

[27:38] The Lord is so clearly with him that all Israel recognizes him now as a prophet of the Lord. Things are set now for Samuel to become the last judge of Israel and the first prophet of the era of the kings.

[27:53] Now as we turn to chapter 3, God has been mostly silent in Israel for a time, not giving many visions or prophecies to his people.

[28:04] His word was rare and infrequent. We see that in 1 Samuel 3.1. But that is about to change as God begins to deliver messages to his people through this boy, Samuel.

[28:17] Eli the priest had grown very old in 2.22 and his eyesight was failing. One night he was lying down in the bed not far from the temple.

[28:28] Young Samuel was sleeping there in the temple not far from the ark of the covenant behind its veil where God allowed his presence to rest on the earth.

[28:39] And this is thrown in, I think, the ark is going to become a very... It always has been a very important thing ever since God, back in the Exodus, had them build the temple and the ark and everything that went with it.

[28:53] So this ark is still with them. And it's there where Eli is at in that temple where they worship and give sacrifices. Suddenly Samuel hears someone call his name.

[29:04] He does not know that it is the Lord and runs to Eli. And he says, Eli, something is happening. Somebody is trying to talk to me. I don't understand. Is it you?

[29:15] And of course, Eli says, no, it's not me. Go back to your bed. And he does it again. Something speaks to him. He goes to him a second time. Now he goes to him a third time. When it happens the third time, Eli realizes a boy standing by his bed is hearing the voice of the Lord.

[29:31] He tells Samuel what to do if it happens again. The boy should say, okay, Lord, speak. And for your servant hears. This time the Lord comes and stands before Samuel and says his name twice, Samuel, Samuel.

[29:47] And Samuel responds, speak for your servant hears. So the Lord talks to Samuel. The Lord's message is not an easy one. God's telling young Samuel that he is about to do something that will shock the people using an expression that evokes ringing of ears and shaking in terror.

[30:05] We see that in 2 Samuel 27 and 36. He is going to bring about everything he had previously said he would do against Eli and his house, including his descendants.

[30:20] So God has given now, given Samuel this dream, and now he's given it to Eli. Samuel stays in bed until morning.

[30:31] Then he gets up to carry his duties, and he comes to Eli. And when Samuel arrives, Eli explains to Samuel that it is his duty to deliver the message the Lord gave to him and not to leave anything out.

[30:46] Samuel describes the Lord's message of judgment against Eli. And the old prophet responds almost with a shrug. It's the Lord to do what seems good.

[30:59] And we see that in 1 Samuel 3, 15 through 18. Eli, being a priest, says, I don't like what you're saying, but it's the Lord's will.

[31:10] And if that's what it is, that's what it will continue to be. Samuel continues to grow and continues to receive messages from the Lord for his people. The Lord does not allow any of Samuel's prophecies, words to fall to the ground.

[31:26] They are never untrue or unfulfilled. Everyone in Israel comes to know that Samuel is a true prophet of the Lord. And again, what is the definition of a true prophet?

[31:39] Do we have prophets today? I'm sure some people out there today are saying, yeah, I'm a prophet. Listen to me. But he says here, and he said it in scriptures other places, a prophet, if I speak the word to the prophet, it will be true.

[31:56] And that's exactly what's happening here. Samuel's becoming a true prophet. Now turn to chapters, chapter four. I'll be going through chapter four, five, six, and seven, probably fairly quick.

[32:17] Then we'll be getting to chapter eight, and that's where they're going to be asking for a king. But chapter four in 1 Samuel 4, one, begins with Israel as they went out to battle against the Philistines.

[32:33] The Philistines were winning this battle. In fact, they killed around 4,000 men of Israel. So during this time, they were still fighting the Philistines. At this time, the Philistines were winning.

[32:45] In 1 Samuel 4, 4 through 5, the elders figure that Israel needed to bring out, now who's the elders? The elders of the Israelites, to bring out their secret weapon.

[32:57] Their secret weapon was the Ark of the Covenant, which represented the presence of the Lord. This would help them win the battle against the Philistines. They only forgot that the righteousnesses needed to bring the actual presence of the Lord.

[33:15] After all these years, they're going into battle, and they're losing. What's the thing that they come with? Go get the Ark. That Ark has got to protect us.

[33:28] Instead of turning back to God, they're turning to a symbol, which at that point was the Ark. They were going to use it that way. So in 1 Samuel 4, 6, now the Philistines, it kind of shook them because it rattled the Philistines that reminded them of what God did with the Egyptians.

[33:49] You know, Philistines, all these times, and all the years have passed, they were passing down traditions also, weren't they? And they were passing down what God did for these people, the nation of Israel, there in Egypt, and through the Exodus, and through when they finally got into Canaan and fought some of the Canaanites and the otherites, and the Philistines.

[34:14] So this was a history that was there for them because they also knew that the Lord was with the nation of Israel. So it shook them. It reminded them of what God did to the Egyptians.

[34:27] Lucky for the Philistines, they had a general. God was against Israel in this cause, but this general had a competent general who ordered them to calm down and to fight like men.

[34:39] And in 4, verses 10 and 11, it worked. The Philistines killed 30,000 Hebrew soldiers in the battle. Israel fled the scene. The Ark of the Covenant was captured and taken by the Philistines, along with 30,000 killed in Israel were Eli's sons, both of them, on the same day.

[35:05] Now that was a dream, a prophecy that he received years before as God talked to him in those dreams that he had. 1 Samuel 12, 18.

[35:18] Then the news came to Eli, who was very old now at this point. The messenger told Eli what happened at the battle. When Eli heard that the Philistines captured the Ark of the Covenant and that his sons were killed, the high priest fell back in his chair and broke his neck.

[35:41] All those prophecies came true. All those years that Eli ruled. He ruled until his sons died.

[35:51] And when those sons died, his line was cut off and also he fell and lost his life at that point. Which is exactly what God had told Samuel.

[36:05] So now let's turn to 1 Samuel 5. Now that the Philistines have the Ark of the Covenant, are they happy? Yeah, they are at first.

[36:18] But they take the Ark back and they put it beside their own God. And what happens? The next day they come out and their God has fallen down. They say, well, what happened?

[36:29] We don't know what happened. Put our statue back up, their temple or their God back up. The next day they come out and what happened? It fell down and broke its head off.

[36:44] Now they know, hey, we made a mistake. We took the Ark of the Israelites and we're going to pay for it. Because God is with this Ark.

[36:57] That was a symbol of God. So it worked. So in the morning, as it broke the dragon's head, only the stump of the dragon was left.

[37:09] God got a little serious about being around a false God. Wouldn't you say? Yeah, you did. God began to put plagues on the Philistines as well as on Dagon, their God.

[37:20] And when they started to develop diseases, they realized that these plagues were coming from the Ark of the Covenant of the God of Israel. 1 Samuel 5, 8 and 12.

[37:31] They began to make plans at that moment to get rid of the Ark of God. They sent the Ark of... Okay, the next day they sent it to Echol and they started to send it around to different places.

[37:49] They sent it to this city. This city would get the plagues. They sent it to another city of the Philistines. That city would get the plagues. Finally, they said, hey, get all of our leaders together.

[38:03] Bring them in and we're going to discuss on how we're going to get it, what we're going to do. All of our people are getting all these plagues put upon them. They're getting boils. They're getting all kinds of diseases. So they all get together and they come up with a conclusion.

[38:18] Hey guys, we got to give it back to them. We got to give this thing back to the nation of Israel. So they were reminded not to harden our hearts as the Pharaoh did in Egypt.

[38:33] That they would be also destroyed as Egypt was. They did as they were counseled and they came up with a plan to take the Ark back to the nation of Israel.

[38:44] And the Levites come out to meet them. They took the Ark of the Lord and made sacrifices to the Lord in the same day. Each of the five lords of the Philistines returned back to their homes.

[38:56] In chapter 7, we see that all this has taken place. The Ark is back. And now Samuel, the glory may have left Israel for a few chapters prior, which we've just gone through.

[39:08] But this chapter begins with the men of Capra Jermah as they came and picked up the Ark of the Lord. It had been 20 years since Israel possessed the Ark of God as it remained in captivity.

[39:25] His son, this son's Ebikonizer was sanctioned to keep the Ark of the Lord there. The children of Israel laminated over the Ark of the Lord, but not for long.

[39:36] Samuel the prophet had the answer. What was the answer? He told them to put away their strange gods and deal with God of Israel only.

[39:50] So Samuel prayed desperately before God for Israel's sake. And as the Philistines approached, God began a thunderous storm. The storm was so bad that it totally upstepped the Philistines and they were smitten before Israel.

[40:06] Again, another big battle. Who wins it? God wins it. The guys didn't have to go out and fight at all.

[40:16] All they did was have a thunderstorm. Now we had a thunderstorm here not too long ago. But this is a thunderstorm that's beyond any thunderstorm that we can even dream of because it completely destroyed that army that was going out.

[40:33] So, well, it's a quarter till. So, I think I'm going to leave off there. Next week we'll start with chapter 8 and that's when we're going to see Samuel anointing a new king for the nation of Israel.

[40:49] Something that's never been there before. Yes, Terry. The disparity between Deborah being in a position of leadership and Timothy says a woman should learn in quietness and full submission.

[41:07] I do not permit a woman to teach or have authority over a man. She must be silent. What... Let me repeat that. No. Okay.

[41:19] The disparity between Deborah being placed in a position of leadership being a judge and in Timothy 2, 11 and 12 a woman should learn in quietness and full submission.

[41:34] I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man. She must be silent. But what... Can you explain why that disparity exists?

[41:45] No. All I can say about that is the fact that cultures has probably lent its way for that. I mean, back then during those judges period God chose a woman.

[41:58] Why? It doesn't say why he chose a woman. And I don't think at that time it was the fact that at that time he said that there was no woman to teach or anything. It was a culture.

[42:11] Where men looked at more than the women were? Yes, it probably was. But for some reason he chose a woman at that point. And when we get into the New Testament and other parts of the new Christianity yeah, Timothy did tell that women were not to teach.

[42:30] and that's kind of some of the philosophies that our Christianity has today. Of course, that is just prairie, isn't it? So, Ron, can I add to that?

[42:42] Yeah, you sure can. So, one of the things that happened with Deborah is... Who was it that... What was the name of the general that came to her? Beric? Beric, yeah.

[42:53] And she kind of scolded him, right? Because he didn't basically have the courage to... I can't remember exactly the situation but she says, alright, I guess a woman's gonna go out and she was mocking him because that's not what a woman is supposed to do, go into battle and lead men into battle.

[43:12] Gracious. There's a... I can't remember where it's at in the scripture. I think it's in one of the major prophets but it talks about basically Israel being under judgment and saying that women and children will lead you.

[43:32] And it was a sign of really judgment and ridicule that something like that would take place. And so I think in this situation with Deborah there wasn't anybody else.

[43:48] And so there was a faithful woman and so she took it on and it wasn't... It was to Israel's really detriment, right? To their shame that they couldn't find a man who could fill that role.

[44:02] So anyway, that's... Okay. That's what I think one of the things going on there. Yeah. But God did use her. Yeah. Without a doubt. He used her. She defeated. They had peace.

[44:13] And I think, like I said, she ruled for 40 years. So that was the time that God used the lady. And any other questions before we finish up?

[44:26] If not, next week... Well, we won't. Next week is Easter. So there won't be any Sunday school next week. But two weeks from today? I had a couple comments, Ron.

[44:36] Okay. One, just looking at Eli and his sons. It seems like Eli was generally faithful to the Lord, right? But he really failed, it seems, with his sons.

[44:49] His sons were just horrific. With his sons. And that just speaks to me, you know, of the importance that it is, not just to be faithful yourself, but as a father, as a parent.

[45:01] Oh, yeah. Yeah. As parents, we need to pass on the faith to our children and teach them to be faithful as well. Matter of fact, in our next lesson, we're going to see somebody else run against the same thing.

[45:19] And this is the man that we're talking about that God is using at this point to change the course of history for Israel. And who is it that's going to say, Samuel, your sons are ruining our country.

[45:35] Yeah. We need a king. Yeah. And it didn't stop with Samuel, right? No. David had a few sons that were pretty messed up. Anything else? Going along with what Nathan just said, it's not only important for fathers to teach their sons and instruct them, but God's judgment on Eli was, you've honored your son above me.

[46:02] Yeah, absolutely. And rather than chasing the boys, for their actions, he let them continue in it because for whatever reason, God determined that the honor of God wasn't as important to Eli.

[46:25] All of these things give huge pictures, though, for my Christian walk. everything from the judges and Israels. Yeah.

[46:37] The more I fool around with immoral stuff, the further from God I'm going to go. I'm glad I live in the day of grace and I can live in freedom.

[46:50] Oh. However, God doesn't say go out and mess around because grace, so that grace can more abound. He said, God forbid.

[47:01] God forbid. And these things are written so that I learn not to do this. Yeah. the whole Old Testament pretty much says the nation of Israel, I'm your God.

[47:20] And I told you from the beginning, if you obey my commandments, if you come to me with an open heart, everything will be good for you.

[47:33] But if it doesn't, it will not be good for you. And that's like a good father. You know, we do that as fathers. We go to our children and say, obey.

[47:46] If you do these, these things will happen. If you don't do these things, this is what's going to happen. And God gave us a lesson plan that's good throughout eternity.

[47:59] We just have a problem of obeying. David? See, see how performance-based that that was back then versus the grace now, though.

[48:10] It's quite a contrast. It was all performance. You have to do this. You have to do this. Yeah. But those people wanted something like that.

[48:21] They wanted God to tell them step by step. And even when they did it, they couldn't follow it. And we see a clue through the history there. Okay, well, it's getting time, so we'll see you in a couple weeks.

[48:34] Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.