We can begin the secret service by singing song number 110, All the Way, by St. Louis
And, All the Way, by St. Louis
The song number 110
I have been my guide, and be pleased, be my instructor, be my faith, be my quell
For I know a year before me, Jesus came with all things well
Dashing from the rock before me, lo, a spring of joy I sing
All praise may my Savior please me, all the fullness of His love
Perfect blessing with His promise, if I've got His house above
When my spirit of the world makes its light to rise again
Place my soul through endless ages, Jesus bring me all the faith
The first day of this class, it's number five
Then I surveyed the wondrous cross, on which the Prince of Glory died
By which I speak, I can but pause, this Lord content on all my pride
Forgive me, Lord, that I should boast, save in the deck of Christ my God
All the vain things that have drawn me most, I sacrifice them to His love
Sing from His hand, His hands, His feet
Sorrow and love, lo, He will bow down
It is such love as sorrow be, Lord, Lord's come, Lord's soul, praise your Christ
Heard the whole crowd, all of nature mine
That were a present far too small
Oh, so amazing, so divine
He raised my soul high, high, high, high, high, high
And to start to go over the announcements, we will be following what we say in Psalm 449
All right, if you need a bulletin, go ahead and slip up your hand, and Brother Fabian will bring you one.
As always, we have our service times there, listed above, every Sunday at 10.30 a.m.
Of course, this Sunday we'll be having the evening service at 3.30, due to the anniversary, so keep that in mind.
We've also got the Churchwide Soul Winning, as well as the Salvations and Baptisms for both the month and year.
And as I mentioned there, we have the four-year anniversary coming up, just a couple days away.
So we've got brisket thawing, and hopefully nothing else back there.
And we've got food piling up around here, so come on out, help us get that eaten, and help us celebrate four years.
So it's been a great four years, and we're looking forward to another great year coming up.
And also, I didn't really think about the whole doughnut situation on Sunday, but I think I'm probably going to postpone the doughnuts until next Sunday.
Apologies to all the September birthday people out there. You can just pretend that we're having the potluck in your honor instead, and then you can have doughnuts the next week.
Because it kind of dawned on me that typically I get three dozen doughnuts. That's not going to cut it for 100 people.
And I'm not going to go buy 100 doughnuts. I only have so much willpower, folks, and only so much room in the van.
So we're going to celebrate those the following week, so you can have that to look forward to.
Don't forget, we're working on the weekly Bible memory project, I guess we would call this.
And I was a little shocked how easily this went for a lot of you, that you guys just seemed to have picked this up pretty quickly.
Probably because a lot of you already kind of had the Old Testament books memorized. But we'll see how you do.
We'll see how you do. There's a lot further to go. You've only begun.
But I hope everyone pulls it off. I just was a little taken aback. I think some of you cranked it out the same day.
But again, we're doing the books of the Old Testament and how many chapters are in each book.
Children that are eight years old or younger can just stick to just the books and not worry about the chapters. You know the drill there.
And then on the back, don't forget, we're going to be celebrating the graduation of Abby and Robert Martinez.
A week from this Saturday, so come on out for that. At 1 p.m. we're going to have tacos carne asada from Juanito's.
And then there's going to be a baby shower the Saturday after that on September 17th at 2 p.m. from 2 to 5 p.m.
And there's a gift registry there. You know the deal there.
And then also before I forget, what I need, I know it's Thursday and everyone kind of wants to get home.
It's the midweek. I get that. And you definitely want me to just shut up and get the service over with.
But we've got to talk about, in the announcements real quick, about how we're going to deal with setting up on Sunday.
And it looks like we have some able-bodied people here.
And we'll kind of have to kind of, I don't want to just go into Sunday morning, you know, shooting from the hip trying to get this thing set up.
Because as soon as the Sunday morning service is over, we have to transform this area into enough seating for about 100 people with tables.
And I'm picking up rental tables. They'll be staged here.
I don't want to bore you with all the details, but if we could just get any men and young men that are ready, willing, and able to help me on Sunday.
Just meet with me after the service tonight. Right after the service, we'll just meet up here.
Just so I can quickly go over what I have in mind so everyone kind of has an idea of how we can quickly set this place up.
Because basically I'm going to have to get 100 people to go on that side of the wall while we set this up.
So I need guys that kind of know what to do when I say break.
And we can just set this up in a matter of five to ten minutes before we get stampeded by a bunch of hangry Baptists.
Who have just been sitting through a sermon smelling the savory meats.
So if there's some men, if you guys can meet with me right after the service, we'll just meet here.
It won't take long. I won't go into great detail, but just so we can get an idea, I can explain the blue tape on the floor a little bit.
And then that way we can go into Sunday morning with a game plan and prepare.
And I'm not just trying to herd cats.
So that's that. Also do continue to pray for brother Adam and his mother.
I know most everybody already knows, but I just want to mention again that she has got home to hospice.
She's going to be passing on. So just continue to pray for them.
That that's a peaceful process. That she's comfortable.
And that even in that, that God is glorified and the gospel is preached.
I know Adam has already gotten his brother saved through this whole ordeal.
Thus far. So pray that that continues. And anyway, just want to keep that in front of us.
Okay. So also don't forget on the Sunday after this next two weeks from this Sunday, we're going to be starting a sermon series called Our Vision for 2023.
And I know it's kind of early, but it's actually going to be kind of a lead into another sermon series that I want to start on Sunday mornings.
And I think it's important at this stage in our church's life to really start to get a vision for the future.
And I don't want to go into all that right now. Obviously, we've got a whole another sermon to preach.
But if you can make it out for those series, those sermons, I know it'll be a blessing to you and it'd really help lay some groundwork.
Anyway, you got the songs listed there below that as well. Let's go ahead and count up the salvation's going back to Monday or Tuesday or yesterday, Wednesday.
And then what about for the group today? Most people would just do this. You're like taking a one and you're doing, I thought maybe you were drawing a number.
See, now you're confused. This isn't baseball. That's what it is. Okay. All right.
That'll do it for announcements. We'll go ahead and sing one more song before we get to the preaching tonight.
And I know he said on every
day.
Yeah.
The entire chapter.
Second Kings chapter number three, the Bible reads,
And 100,000 rams with the wool, but it came to pass when Ahab was dead that the king of Moab rebelled against the king of Israel.
And King Jehoram went out of Samaria at the same time and numbered all Israel. And he went and sent to Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, saying the king of Moab had rebelled against me.
Wilt thou go with me against Moab to battle? And he said, I will go up. I am as thou art and my people as thy people and my horses as thy horses.
And he said, Which way shall we go up? And he answered, The way through the wilderness of Edom. So the king of Israel went and the king of Judah and the king of Edom.
And they fetched a compass of seven days journey, and there was no water for the host and for the cattle that followed them.
And the king of Israel said, Alas, the Lord hath called these three kings together to deliver them into the hand of Moab.
But Jehoshaphat said, Is there not a prophet of the Lord that may inquire, excuse me, not a prophet that may inquire of the Lord by him?
And one of the king of Israel's servants answered and said, Here is Elisha the son of Shaphat, which poured water on the hands of Elijah.
And Jehoshaphat said, The word of the Lord is with him. So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat and the king of Edom went down to him.
And Elisha said unto the king of Israel, What have I to do with thee? Get thee to the prophets of thy father and the prophets of thy mother.
And the king of Israel said unto him, Nay, for the Lord hath called these three kings together to deliver them into the hand of Moab.
And Elisha said, As the Lord of hosts liveth before whom I stand, surely were it not that I regard the presence of Jehoshaphat the king of Judah,
I would not look toward thee nor see thee. But now bring me a minstrel.
And it came to pass when the minstrel played and the hand of the Lord came upon him.
And he said, Thus saith the Lord, Make this valley full of ditches.
For thus saith the Lord, Ye shall not see wind, neither shall ye see rain.
Yet the valley shall be filled with water, that ye may drink both ye and you and your cattle and your beasts.
And this is but a light thing in the sight of the Lord. He will deliver the Moabites also into your hand,
and ye shall smite every fence city and every choice city, and shall fell every good tree and stop all wells of water,
and mar every good piece of land with stones.
And it came to pass in the morning when the meat offering was offered,
that behold there came water by the way of Edom, and the country was filled with water.
And when all the Moabites heard that the kings would come up to fight against them,
they gathered all that were able to put on armor and upward and stood in the border.
And they rose up early in the morning, and the sun shone upon the water,
and the Moabites saw the water on the other side as red as blood.
And they said, This is blood, the kings are surely slain, and they have smitten one another, now therefore Moab to the spoil.
And when they came to the camp of Israel, the Israelites rose up and smote the Moabites,
so that they fled from before them, but they went forward smiting the Moabites even in their country.
And they beat down the cities, and in every good piece of land cast every man his stone and filled it,
and they stopped all the wells of water, and felled all the good trees.
Only in Kerharseth left they the stones thereof, howbeit the slingers went about it and smote it.
And when the king of Moab saw that the battle was too sore for him, he took with him seven hundred men and drew swords
to break through even unto the king of Edom, but they could not.
And he took his eldest son that should have reigned in a stead and offered him for a burnt offering upon the wall,
and there was great indignation against Israel, and they departed from him and returned to their own land.
Let's go ahead and have a word of prayer.
Dear Lord, again, thank you for the time that we have to come together for the preaching of your word.
Lord, I pray and ask that you would help me to preach it tonight, Lord, that it would be edifying to your people.
And, Lord, you know that there is nothing that we can do without you, Lord,
and I pray that you would help us to know that, Lord, and that you would help me to rely on you and your spirit,
and, Lord, that you would again fill me and guide me in my words tonight.
We ask these things in Christ's name. Amen.
So in 2 Kings here in chapter 3, of course, there's this really cool miracle that we read about that Elisha performs
when he tells them to dig these ditches, and they fill it with water, and they had this great victory over Moab,
and that's obviously, you know, the main part of the story, but there's just a few things before we get to that
I want to point out here in the beginning where it says there,
Now Jehoram the son of Ahab began to reign over Israel and Samir on the 18th year of Jehoshaphat king of Judah,
and he reigned 12 years, and he wrought evil in the sight of the Lord, but not like his father.
So the Bible is being very careful here to remind us that Jehoram is still an evil man, that this is a wicked guy.
However, you know, though he wrought evil in the sight of the Lord, he did it but not like his father, which was Ahab.
And we just got done with 1 Kings, we read about all the things that Ahab did and Jezebel did,
not like his father and like his mother Jezebel, right? They were very wicked, okay?
But it does say about Jehoram the son of Ahab that he was not like him.
He did do evil, but not, when he says but he was not like him, he's meaning, basically it's saying but he wasn't as bad. Why?
Because for he put away the image of Baal that his father had made, but it goes on and says,
nevertheless he cleaved on the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat which made Israel sin, he departed not from them.
So there was some good things that he did, but really what we need to learn from this is that, you know,
in the case of Jehoram, it was too little, too late. You know, we have to remember that he was already cursed for the actions of Ahab,
God already knew what kind of children they were going to be and this is something that, you know,
we need to take heed to and understand as parents is that, you know,
the way we live our lives has a lasting effect on the generations that come after us.
You know, the way we lead our children, you know, that's going to leave an impression on them,
that's going to obviously form the way they behave, the decisions they make in life
and even if they try to get a little bit right, sometimes that's not going to be enough.
We have, you know, Jehoram here where although he's putting away the image of Baal,
although he's not as bad as mom and dad, he's still an evil guy.
So our sins can have, you know, a ripple effect, you know, through generations to come
and that's something that, you know, we need to keep in mind.
We know, you know, from the story here that Jehoram is doomed,
that he is eventually going to be slain in chapter 9 by Jehu.
You know, spoiler alert if you didn't already know that, but he's a doomed guy.
Now, there are some things about Jehoram in this chapter that show you the way that he is not like his father.
For example, when he gets with Jehoshaphat and they're going to go to war
and they find themselves, it says there, you know, they went into Israel, verse 9,
so the king of Israel went and the king of Judah and the king of Edom and they fetched a compass seven days journey
and there was no water for the host and for the cattle that followed.
So that's kind of the background of the story.
You know, Jehoshaphat, Jehoram, this king of Edom, they get together and they go seven days journey into the wilderness
but then they find that there's no water. They're already seven days in.
They're kind of counting on there being water along the way and they get in seven days and they find out there isn't any.
You know, and obviously we should know this, you know, living in a desert, you know, you don't want to get very far from water
when you're in a barren land, when you're out there marching with an army nonetheless,
when you're out there trying to support these beasts, these cattle, these men, this army to go to war,
you know, water is a very important thing.
You have to have that, you know, professional armies today, they have that supply chains with that truck
and there's a whole division of the army that does that.
You know, here they're kind of probably just counting, well, let's go the way of Edom.
There's typically water there and they get there seven days in and they kind of find themselves in this pickle where there is no water.
And now it's like, well, it's seven days back out to where we know there's water, no one's going to make it.
So you can kind of see, you know, how intense of a situation this is, how dire of a situation this is
where they're basically, you know, it's a death sentence that they're all going to perish from just from thirst alone
before they even get to the battle.
But the point is this, is that notice how Jehoram is not like his father in this regard
because it says in verse 11 that Jehoshaphat said,
Is there not here a prophet of the Lord that we may acquire of the Lord by him?
And one of the king of Israel's servants answered and said,
Here is Elisha the son of Shaphat which poured water on the hands of Elisha.
He said, well, you know, Elisha's not too far off, we could go see him.
And notice it says there in verse 12 that Jehoshaphat said the word of the Lord is with him
so the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat went and the king of Israel went down to him.
Now it's interesting because when Jehoshaphat asked the same question of Ahab in 1 Kings 22
they said, well, there's Micaiah, right?
But was Ahab very open to that? Do we remember that story?
Was Ahab real open to this prophet of the Lord?
No, he had all those other false prophets there, remember?
And what did he say about Micaiah? He said, I don't like him. Why?
Because he does not prophesy good concerning me.
And he remembered how that story played out too.
You see here that they went down, they actually went to where Elisha was.
The kings, you know, they were in such a position, they were saying, hey, let's go see him instead
instead of doing what we did with Micaiah and saying, hey, go see, you know, the king wants to see you.
That's how it played out with Ahab.
So you can see here in a way that, you know, Jehoash or, you know, he is more humble than his father Ahab.
Why? Because he's willing to be led down to this man of God.
And it kind of makes you wonder if maybe he had heard some of the preaching of Elisha,
he had heard about some of the prophecies that Elijah had prophesied concerning him and Ahab.
If maybe, you know, that's why he was more compelled to get rid of, you know, the images of Baal
and when it came time to go see the man of God, he maybe didn't object as much as Ahab did.
He was a little bit more open to the things of God, as it were.
Maybe because he had heard some of the preaching about him.
But again, it goes back to my original point, it still wasn't enough.
You know, he was already doomed. He was still a very wicked man.
And Jehoshaphat says in verse 12, the word of the Lord is with him, so the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat,
the king of Edom and the king of Edom went down to him.
And Elisha said to the king of Israel, and notice this too, this shows a little bit more of the fact
how he's not like his father Ahab. Still wicked, but not as bad.
Because of the fact when he gets there, you know, Elisha doesn't exactly just throw his arms open
and say, I'm just so glad to see you guys. He gets a very cold reception.
This isn't a very warm reception at all.
Elisha said to the king of Israel, what have I to do with thee?
He said, what are you doing here?
Get thee to the prophets of thy father and the prophets of thy mother.
He's saying, why don't you go worship Baal? Why don't you go inquire of them?
You know, your parents were so into them, why don't you go see them?
And notice again, you know, that the king of Israel said unto him, nay.
He didn't object like Ahab did and say, did I not tell thee that he only prophesied evil concerning me?
Didn't I tell you that he just had it out for me?
No, what was his response here? He said, nay.
For the Lord hath called these three kings together to deliver them into the hand of Moab.
He's saying, actually, we really need your help.
You know, you can go ahead and say whatever you want about me.
You can go ahead and say whatever you want about my parents.
We just really need your help.
You know, he was in such a position that, you know, here he is a king being rebuked by the man of God saying,
I don't have anything to do with you.
You know, go get you to your, I don't care who you are, I don't care about your title.
And what does he do? He takes that.
Right, he takes that rebuke and as a result, you know, Elisha has a change of heart and
not necessarily towards him but goes ahead and performs this miracle.
You know, he could have just thrown a fit and just said, well, I told you this is the way this guy is.
You know, my dad was right about you guys.
You know, you prophets of the Lord are all the same and just marched off.
So you can kind of see how he was not like his father as it says there in verse 2.
That, you know, although he was still wicked, although he was still doomed,
you know, he put away the prophets of Baal and he was a little bit more open to things of God.
But you know what? It wasn't enough, was it?
You know, and again, that should be a warning to us as parents that,
you know, the lies we need, the impressions that we make on our children, you know, are long lasting.
That they're deep.
You know, and maybe our children will make some of the mistakes that we made but you know what?
If we're wicked enough, if we're bad enough, you know, they'll still make plenty of mistakes on their own as a result.
The other thing I want to point out here is that when he goes to war,
it says in verse 6,
Now if you remember, this was kind of something that Jehoshaphat has been rebuked for
when he hooked up with Ahaziah and Ahab as well.
He kind of gets called out on the carpet for, you know, having something to do with wicked ungodly people.
But you don't see it in this instance.
You know, and I really don't want to go deep into the weeds on all the chronology of the kings.
One, because it's still something I'm still kind of foggy about myself.
It's a very complicated subject.
You know, I'm thankful for chapters like this because God always leaves something.
You know, the Bible's like that onion.
You know, there's the real deep things, the real complicated things, the real pungent things
that are going to break tears to your eyes if you try to get down to them, right?
But then he always leaves that outer layer for others, you know, who can come along
and kind of just make these surface applications and still get sermons out of it.
You know, we could do the deep dive on all the lineage of the kings and things like that,
the prophets that reigned.
You know, there's definitely a time and a place for that.
But again, that's really getting in the weeds.
But you kind of might scratch your head and think about why is Jehoshaphat,
why hasn't he learned his lesson?
Why is he teaming up again to go out and fight with this ungodly king
who even Elisha doesn't want anything to do with?
Well, you don't have to go there, but in 2 Chronicles 20, in a parallel passage,
what we find is that Moab has already been at war with Jehoshaphat.
He's already kind of been dealing with the Moabites and the Ammonites
and I believe even the Assyrians at that point are coming at him a little bit.
So he's already dealing with these foreign nations.
So it's not like he's just sitting back with nothing better to do.
This is probably politically motivated.
This is something where he's like, yeah, you know what?
The enemy of my enemy is my friend kind of a thing.
Because Jehoshaphat had spent his time really strengthening the southern kingdom
and safeguarding it against a potential rebellion by the northern kingdom
with them trying to take back over.
He had become very powerful.
In fact, let's just go to 2 Chronicles 20 very quickly.
Just go there very quick because it really shows you the character of Jehoshaphat.
Because you might read that and say, wait a minute, he's doing it again?
He's hooking up with this wicked king and going out there again.
But we need to kind of examine his character a little bit more.
And maybe there's another motive as to why he wants to go out to war.
It says in verse 1, it came to pass after this, which is what?
Verses 18 and 19 where Ahab is slain and then Jehoshaphat comes back
and Hanani the seer comes out and rebukes him saying,
shouldest thou help the ungodly and love them that hate the Lord?
Then you get to verse 20, so it says it came to pass after this.
Also that the children of Moab and the children of Ammon and the others
and with them beside the Ammonites came against Jehoshaphat to battle
and there came some that told Jehoshaphat saying,
there cometh a great multitude from beyond the sea on this side of Syria
and behold they be in Hazan-Tamar which is in Gedi.
And notice how Jehoshaphat reacts there in verse 3.
It says, and Jehoshaphat feared and set himself to seek the Lord
and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah and Judah themselves together
to ask help of the Lord even out of all the cities of Judah that came to seek the Lord.
So Jehoshaphat is a good king. He's already been fighting this battle.
He's one that already seeks the Lord. I mean, that's his reaction here.
He's a man of faith. When they're saying, hey, we don't have any water to drink.
What are we going to do? He's like, well, let's inquire of the Lord.
You got a man of God around here somewhere that we can go talk to?
And they say, hey, here's Elisha. And then they do what he's told.
So don't let that throw you there when you see him doing the same thing again.
He's a godly man. He's a good leader. He's a good king.
And there's probably just some other motives probably that are more politically motivated here
and why he's doing that.
And I don't see him being rebuked for having done this.
So there's that. That's kind of the background of this leading up to this miracle that is performed.
The other thing I want to point out here is the difference there
between Jehoash and Jehoshaphat's reaction when they get in this position.
Jehoshaphat is like, hey, let's just seek the Lord.
When we find ourselves in this tough situation, we find ourselves in need of help, let's go seek God.
That ought to be our first instinct.
That ought to be the first person that we go to when we find ourselves in trouble.
It should be God.
We should find ourselves praying out and crying out to God.
If we have a real need, who do we go to first?
Who is it that we're seeking? Is it the Lord? It ought to be.
And notice that's the opposite of what Jehoash did.
Or Jehoram, excuse me.
Jehoram, he just freaks out.
They get seven days in the wilderness and he's just like, we're dead.
He doesn't even have an answer. He instantly goes into panic mode.
That's what he says in verse 10.
The king of Israel said, alas, the Lord hath called these three kings together to deliver him in the hand of Moab.
This was his idea. This was all his plan.
So maybe this is a little bit of a guilty conscience coming out.
You're like, oh, I know this was my idea, but I got a lot of things. Maybe God's just judging me for this.
But really, what I want to point out here is that the difference between somebody who has faith and somebody who does not.
A person who has faith has hope.
People who do not have faith in God do not have hope.
They're like Jehoram here. They're like him in the way that they're just very easily discouraged.
Very easily just at the end of their rope.
They're just instantly without hope.
And if you would, keep something there. Let's go over to 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
Look, when you don't have faith in God, when your instinct isn't to fear the Lord.
I mean, Jehoshaphat, he's facing armies from several different nations.
He's come up against armies. He's defending his nation.
He's hearing, hey, this army's coming across the sea to fight you.
And he's not just like, oh, we're all dead.
Why? Because he has the Lord. He has faith in God. He is somebody that seeks the Lord. He fears God.
Therefore, he has hope.
And people who do not have God are hopeless.
And look, there's a lot of people in this world that do not have any hope.
They're going through life and they might not look like it on the surface.
But in many instances, in the back of their minds, deep down in the recesses of their heart, they are hopeless people.
And all they're doing is just spending their life trying to just not think about the fact that they don't know where they're going when they're dying.
They're uncertain of what the future holds. They're fearful of what's going to become of them.
You know, they are hopeless people. Why? Because they have no faith. That's why.
That's what it says here in 1 Corinthians 15 where you are. Look at verse 19.
It says,
Look, if all that we believe is just some kind of social gospel.
You know, if we just come to church because we're just trying to get some kind of therapy.
You know, all the preacher really is is just someone there to kind of guide us through life's issues.
And look, all those things are fine. Those are good things.
But if that's all Christ is for us, is just in this life, then we're just like everybody else.
Except more so. We're of all men most miserable.
Meaning that most men are miserable. Other men are miserable too. Other people are out there. They're miserable.
They might not look like it. People might look at them and think,
Oh, they're having such a good time. They just seem so carefree.
But a lot of them, what they're doing is just really drowning their sorrows.
You know, they're drinking their sorrows away. They're taking the prescription drugs.
They're smoking the weed. They're entertaining themselves.
You know, maybe it's not some, you know, drug, but it's, you know, they're chasing after money.
They're chasing after things. They're trying to deal with the fact that they have no hope.
You know, and it's the same case with us. You know, if we have hope only of Christ in this life,
then we are of all men most miserable.
You know, we don't have any hope either, but the good news is, of course, that we do have hope.
Beyond this life in Christ.
We could be more like a Jehoshaphat and say, Hey, you know what? Chill out, man.
Let's just go to God. Let's just fear God. Let's go talk to him and let's get a solution.
There's still hope even in this dire circumstance of being seven days into a desert with no water.
There's still hope.
You know, we have this great hope in the fact that, what? Verse 20,
But now Christ is risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.
For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.
For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
But every man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, and then afterward they that are Christ at his comings.
But look at, jump down to verse 25.
For he must reign till he put all enemies under his feet.
The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.
You know, that is the kind of hope that we have.
That even death itself cannot separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus.
There's no height. There's no depth. There's no principality. There's no angels.
There's nothing that can separate us from the love of Christ, not even death itself, the grave.
You know, that's the hope that we should have.
Not just this social gospel that's out there, not just this,
Oh, you know, we're just here to install fence posts for people, and replace appliances,
and put them up in hotel rooms. Look, those are all fine and good things to do.
But if that's all, you know, the hope that you have, that's all that Christ is to you,
then you don't have any hope. How are you any different from anybody else?
You know, at that point, all the gospel is to you is just another coping mechanism.
You know, it's no different than, you know, the alcoholic, or the drug addict, or whatever.
It's just another way for you to deal with the hopelessness.
You know, but the good news is that we're not that.
You know, we have hope in Christ.
And a hope that is steadfast and sure that even death one day shall be destroyed.
Jump down to verse 54. He says,
So when this corruptible have put on incorruption, and this mortal have put on immortality,
then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written,
Death is swallowed up in victory.
Look, that's something that is going to happen. That's a hope that we have.
Even if in this life we perish.
You know, even if this life, you know, our life is cut short,
or even if we live to a long and full age,
you know, we still have a hope in Christ.
Because why? Because death is going to be destroyed.
You know, it says in verse 55,
Oh death, where is thy sting? Oh grave, where is thy victory?
Obviously, the prospect of dying and things like that,
there's always going to be that carnal part of us,
that natural inborn fear of that. I get that.
But you know, our spirit should always be bolstered.
We should always have hope in the fact, you know,
that Christ has delivered us from the bondage of death.
You know, we don't want to be like a Jehoram.
Where it's just, you know, we get some bad news,
or life doesn't go the way we expected, it's just like all is lost.
That's how the world reacts to things.
And look, I know we go through difficulties and things,
and we mourn, and we have afflictions, and trials,
and life can be hard.
But you know, we should never just be hopeless.
You know, there's always hope that we can have in Christ.
And Jehoshaphat, you know, is a great example of that.
Somebody who could face great hardships,
and had enough sense to go to God, and as a result,
was just kind of a, you know, kind of a positive guy.
That's what I see in the scripture.
You know, he's kind of just trying to calm him down and say,
Calm down. Where's the man of God? Let's go inquire of him.
I'm sure God will deliver us.
Because I've seen him do it before.
And of course, that's exactly what happens here in the story.
It says in verse 14,
Elisha said, As the Lord of hosts liveth before my stand,
surely were it not that I regard the presence of Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah.
So he's doing this for Jehoshaphat's sake.
So it kind of shows you the reputation that Jehoshaphat has
as a man of faith, you know, a man that loves the Lord,
and as a result, you know, he's going to be delivered.
He says, Were it not that I regard the presence of Jehoshaphat the king of Judah,
I would not look toward thee, nor see thee.
But now bring me a reinstil, and it came to pass that the minstrel played,
that the hand of the Lord came upon him.
And he said, Thus saith the Lord, Make this valley full of ditches.
That's probably not the answer they wanted to hear.
How are you going to deliver us? Go dig some ditches.
Hey, why don't you go out there and dig?
I mean, nobody wants to be told that.
I don't, I mean, I had a job.
That was literally my job for a while.
To play around in a ditch.
You know, to follow an excavator bucket around.
To dig for utility lines.
You know, anyone who's done it knows that's not,
you know, that's not the Ph.D. you want to get in life.
The post hole digger.
You want to get the Ph.D. that's going to keep you indoors, out of the sun.
You know, but that's, sometimes that's the way, you know,
that's the answer we get.
Oh, you want a solution to your problem?
Well, there's going to be some work involved.
I mean, God's there. God will still do his part.
God will show up and help you.
But you know what? You're going to have to make a little effort on your own, too.
You know, we might find ourselves saying, I lack wisdom.
I need wisdom and, you know, I want to understand the Bible more.
I want to be a better leader in my home.
I want to be a better leader in my church.
I want to be able to be used by God.
You know, God, the Bible says if any man lack wisdom,
let him ask God and it shall be given him.
You know, but we still have to also do what?
Maybe there's going to be some mourning, weeping.
Let your laughter be turned into mourning.
Your joy into sorrow.
You know, we might have some work to do on our end
in order for God to kind of come through for us, if that makes sense.
So that probably wasn't, you know, the answer.
They were probably like, well, we're just going to sit back and let Elisha do all the work.
He's like, no, go grab some shovels and start digging some ditches out here
and I'll show you what God can do.
Put some effort into it.
For thus saith the Lord, verse 17, you shall not see wind,
neither shall you see rain,
yet the valley shall be filled with water,
that you may drink both ye and your cattle and your beasts.
And this is but a light thing in the sight of the Lord.
He will deliver the Moabites also into your hand.
He's like, you know what? God's going to take care of you.
He's going to give you guys water
and then he's also going to defeat this army.
How? By you digging a ditch.
And they're probably sitting there going,
how is digging ditches and water going to deliver us from an enemy?
And of course, you know, there's this,
this is a literal story that took place.
This is something that actually happened.
And I don't know that when Elisha was performing this miracle
that he saw the greater picture here.
But I also believe that this is a great picture of Christ.
This is another beautiful picture of Christ.
You know, Christ is all throughout the Scriptures.
He's in every single story page and he's in every book.
If we look for him, he's there.
And I think this is another great picture here.
So he's saying, look, you know, you dig these ditches,
they'll be filled with water, it's a light thing,
the Moabites will deliver your hand, you know, God will show up,
you have some work to do too.
And he goes on and tells them how, verse 19,
you shall smite every fenced city and every choiced city
and fell every good tree and stopped all the wells
and marred every good piece of land with stones.
He said, look, God's going to give you the victory
if you go out and dig these ditches.
And he says in verse 20, and it came to pass in the morning,
so they digged the ditches, right?
And it came to pass in the morning when the meat offering was offered.
So the ditches have been dug, the work has been done,
but now the meat offering is being made, right?
When the meat offering was made, that behold,
there came water by the way of Edom
and the country was filled with water, okay?
And it says in verse 21, and when all the Moabites
heard that the kings were come to fight against them,
they gathered all that were able to put on armor
and upward and stood in the border.
So they're kind of on the outskirts kind of seeing all this from afar.
And they rose up early in the morning, verse 22,
and the sun shone upon the water.
So they dig the ditches, these ditches fill up with water,
and the Moabites from afar are seeing the sun hit the water.
And it says there, and when the sun shone upon the water
and the Moabites saw the water on their side as red as blood,
and they said, this is blood, the kings have surely slain us.
So what do we have taking place here?
You have water and you have blood, right?
It's not both, but you have, it's one substance, right?
Coming out of one ditch, one hole that has been made in the ground, right?
You have this, obviously there's multiple of them,
but if we're just looking at one, you see one of these ditches,
you know, to one person it's water,
to the Israelites, you know, to Judah, to Israel,
you know, the Edomites that are with them,
they're looking at it, they're seeing water.
You know, the enemy from the other side is seeing blood.
So we have water and blood, that, you know,
that instantly makes me think about, you know, John 19,
if you want to go over there, in John chapter 19.
Where else do we see water and blood?
We see it in Christ, right?
When Christ was crucified, it says in verse 31 of John 19,
and the Jews before, therefore because it was the preparation
that the body should not remain on the cross on the Sabbath day,
for the Sabbath day was in high day,
both besought Pilate that their legs might be broken
and they might be taken away.
Then came the soldiers and break the legs of the first
and of the other which was crucified with him,
and they came to Jesus and saw that he was dead already
and they break not his legs,
but one of the soldiers with the spear pierced his side
and forthwith there came out what?
Blood and water.
And again, what's the thing that triggers the water to come?
It's the meat offering, right?
It's the sacrifice that is being made.
They do their work, they dig the ditches,
but then in the morning when they make a sacrifice,
when they present the meat offering,
which again, all that's all pictures of Christ,
all those sacrifices in the Old Testament,
all pointing towards Christ,
the land that was slain before the foundation of the world,
when that happens, forthwith comes what?
To one water and to another blood.
So you have the blood and the water, right?
And you have this meat offering.
And again, it's a great picture of Christ
and it shows us that we have victory through Christ.
That's the picture there.
That's a picture of salvation.
Because what is it that they're up against?
They're against an enemy that is coming out to destroy them.
And that's the same thing with us in our life.
And I think sometimes we lose sight of that.
We get saved, a few years go by,
and we kind of forget about the fact that at one point
we also were without hope in this world.
That we were also of all men most miserable.
That we were just like everybody else
and that we were going to be defeated by death.
We could not always say,
Death, where is thy victory?
Death, where is thy sting?
Death, grave, where is thy victory?
We couldn't always say that.
There was a time when we were going to be death's next victim.
When sin had a hold of us, it was going to drag us down.
But what made the difference?
It was the water and the blood.
It was the sacrifice that Christ made.
And that's this great picture here of this miracle.
Is that victory is being brought through the blood.
And notice how, like he said in 1 Corinthians,
it just totally disarms him.
There at the 1 Corinthians.
I should have had you keep there.
I'll just read for you in 1 Corinthians.
How he says, death is swallowed up in victory.
Oh death, where is thy sting?
Oh grave, where is thy victory?
It has no sting.
Death doesn't have anything to fight us with anymore.
And that's kind of what plays out in this story.
They see the blood and they think,
Oh the kings have come and they're slain.
It says when they saw the blood,
they rose up early in the morning,
the sun shone, they saw the water on the other side
as red as blood, and they said,
This is blood, the kings are surely slain
and they have smitten one another.
Now therefore, Moab, to the spoil.
Right?
Now, you've got to remember,
when you're going to go spoil,
when he's talking about spoil there,
he's not saying, Let's go eat the rotten vegetables.
What he's saying there is,
We're going to go spoil these guys.
We're going to go take all their jewelry.
We're going to take their weapons.
We're going to take anything that we can find off of them.
Basically, they're going to pat down the bodies.
They're going to look for the loose change or whatever.
They're going to try and get some riches out of this battle.
To the spoil.
Let's go get the cattle.
Let's go get the armor.
Let's go get all these things off these corpses.
So if you're one of these soldiers here
that's going to the spoil,
you've come to a battle, obviously,
what have you brought to the battle in all likelihood?
You've brought some kind of a weapon.
You've brought a weapon, maybe even a shield.
You might even have some of your own armor.
The way I understand it, or what I think about the story,
is because as soon as they get there,
they just get run off immediately.
Israel rises up and just chases them deep into their own.
It's like they can't even put up a fight.
Why?
Because when they went to the spoil,
obviously what they would have done is put all their things down.
Because they're already thinking,
Oh, the victory's already won.
Look at this blood.
They think, we already got this.
They've slain each other.
They've done all the dirty work for us.
All we've got to do is just walk over there
and help ourselves.
So what they end up probably doing,
this is all speculation on my part,
but I think it makes sense,
is they put down their shield,
they put down their sword,
and they might have taken the armor off
to kind of loosen the load a little bit
so they could carry more back,
so they could get more spoil,
they could get a bigger load,
have to take less trips, right?
And it's the same.
And what caused that to happen?
What just delivered them?
It was the blood.
It was the water.
It was the sacrifice that was made.
The meat offering that brought the water and the blood.
And it's the same with us.
You know, we have Christ who has sacrificed himself.
There was the blood.
There was the water that came out at his sacrifice
and has disarmed death.
There is no sting.
There is no victory.
There's nothing that it can do against us.
We're more than conquerors through him that loved us.
You know, it's the same concept.
And it says in verse 24,
And when they came to the camp of the Israel,
the Israelites rose up and smote the Moabites
so that they fled before them,
but they went forward smiting the Moabites
even in their country.
So again, you get this idea,
it was just, you know,
I guess it's pun intended since I recognized it beforehand,
you know, it was a bloodbath.
It's talking about water and blood, right?
Like they thought what they thought was a bloodbath,
they thought what they thought was blood,
you know, the Israelites turned into real blood.
You know, and they're chasing them deep into their,
even into their own country.
I mean, it was just, there was no fight.
You know, that's how much victory,
you know, it's a picture of the victory
that we have over death.
That's why in life we should be more of a Jehoshaphat.
We should be somebody who's quick to have hope in the Lord
and not to be so fearful,
and not always be, you know, just fearful of things.
We should always be people that have hope
because of the fact that God has given us the victory.
It says in verse 25,
And they beat down the cities,
and on every good piece of land cast every man a stone,
and filled it, and they stopped all the wells of water,
and they fell the good trees.
Only in Haraseth left the stones thereof.
Howbeit the slingers went about and smote it.
So they just annihilate these guys, the Moabites.
And when the king of Moab saw that the battle was too sore for him,
he took with him seven hundred men and drew swords
to break through even under the king of Edom,
but they could not.
Then, and then of course, you know, this ending here gets pretty gruesome.
So this king of Moab, you know, he sees that it's over for him.
It's hopeless. He cannot win this battle.
So what's he do?
It says in verse 27 that he took his eldest son that should have reigned in his stead.
So it was the heir apparent, his eldest son,
who he's probably been grooming and teaching and investing in
in order to take over the throne after him.
Well, he takes him and he offers him for a burnt offering upon the wall.
And again, this goes back to what I was saying earlier
about how, you know, like it says in Ephesians,
in fact, we should probably just go there. Let's just go to Ephesians chapter 2.
Ephesians chapter 2.
That people without Christ, you know, they're just groping in the darkness for an answer.
But, you know, the great irony is that often when they're shown the truth,
that they still reject it.
And, you know, in that instance, you know, then God just kind of leaves them to grope.
And they come up with all kinds of odd things to try and deal with the lack of hope that they have.
I mean, the king of Moab is in a hopeless situation.
There is no salvation for him. No one's going to come save the day. He's done.
So rather, you know, but he's not ready to acknowledge the God of Israel.
He's not ready to admit defeat.
You know, he's just grasping at straws just trying to come up with some kind of an answer.
You know, and it's much like the world.
You know, they don't want anything to do with the Bible. They want to reject the God of the Bible.
They don't want anything to do with Jesus.
And then they just start coming up with all these hare-brained ideas to try to explain away existence.
You know, why we're here, where we came from, what's the purpose of life.
You know, those questions don't just go away because you choose to ignore them.
You know, people try to numb that, but it's always there.
And that's when you start getting these crazy ideas.
You know, evolution is aliens.
You see these evolutionists, they'll more readily admit that we were planted by literal aliens
than that there was a creator that made man.
Because they don't want to admit that God is true. They don't want to admit the Bible's true.
Verse 11, it says there in Ephesians 2,
Wherefore remember that ye being in times past Gentiles in the flesh,
who were called uncircumcision by that which is the circumcision of the flesh made by hands,
that at that time ye were without Christ, speaking of aliens, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel,
and strangers from the covenants of the promise, and what, having no hope without God in this world.
When you don't have God, there is no hope.
And the problem with that is, is that, like I said, people are still going to try and come up with an answer.
They're still going to try and come up with a solution, and it can get pretty gruesome.
I mean, he's like, well, let me just offer my son.
I mean, maybe that's part of their religion, maybe that's something they believed, I don't know.
But he offers him for a burnt offering, and it doesn't do anything.
You know, it doesn't give them back all their land, it doesn't unplug all the wells,
it doesn't regrow all the trees and take all the stones out of the fields, it doesn't fix anything.
But notice, you know, the irony here.
It says, and there was great indignation against Israel.
Why? Because they're getting their butts kicked.
The indignation is on the part of the Moabites.
They can't stand Israel, because Israel just marched right through their land and destroyed all their land,
and has even brought them to the place where their king is offering up his first son,
in just some desperate attempt to try and correct things.
And isn't it ironic that instead of getting mad at their king,
or having great indignation against some false god,
or great indignation against whatever led them to where they're at,
they just get mad at Israel.
They're just mad at what Israel did.
And it's the same thing today.
We get up, we preach the Bible, we live for the Lord, we believe the Bible,
you know, we don't have a lot of the problems that the world has.
We say, oh here's your answer, here's the solution, here's the offering that you need to fix that.
And instead of coming to light and understanding the truth, they just get mad.
They just have great indignation towards us.
And what, the world just keeps chasing after their sacrifice.
They don't want the meat offering, they don't want the water, they don't want the blood,
they just want to come up with something else.
You know, they want to go and they want to teach evolution in the public school.
They say, well we don't want to acknowledge the God of the Bible,
so we're just going to offer up, you know, to our, we're just going to answer,
you know, all these questions that kids have by just teaching them,
you know, the religion of evolution, and yes it is a religion.
You know, we're just going to teach them some atheistic philosophy.
That's their answer.
And then they get mad at us for the results.
When, you know, when their philosophy leads them to, you know, committing human sacrifice.
Gee, I wonder what kind of a parallel we could draw with that.
You know, when their philosophy that teaches that, you know, before you were born,
you know, you were basically just a blob of tissue.
You weren't even a living soul. You were expendable.
When we're in there, their offering is, oh, you know, you're just a bunch of animals.
And then we're surprised when they behave like animals.
And they start shooting each other, and they start killing each other,
and they start treating each, you know, them poorly.
But are they going to take the blame for it?
Are they going to be the ones that accept responsibility for having taught that?
No, they say, oh, you're the problem. It's the Christians that are the problem.
Israel, they're the problem. They have great indignation towards us, don't they?
You know, it's like that accusation that gets leveled at us all the time.
Oh, it's preachers like you are the reason why all these LGBTQ, you know, teenagers are killing themselves.
And look, you know, this homo-teen, you know, demographic is killing themselves.
They're either doing it or they're thinking about it at a higher rate than, you know, the straight kids.
But to the tune of one and a half to almost three times the amount.
So I'm not denying that's a reality. That's reality.
All I'm saying is, it's not my fault.
It's not my fault. It's not the Bible's fault. It's not the preacher's fault.
You know whose fault it might be? It's the people that filled their heads with that nonsense.
That filled their heads with that garbage and told them, oh, go be a freak.
That decided to tell them that, you know, the Bible is just a Stone Age book written by a bunch of, you know, goat herders in the Bronze Age.
It's just for a bunch of knuckle dragon Neanderthals.
You know, you're the one that is destroying, they're the ones that are destroying children's faith and causing them to become reprobates at such a young age.
Parents are, you know, encouraging their children.
Oh, little Billy, do you want to wear a dress?
And it sounds crazy. It's out there.
I mean, I took that old piano up to Portland. I saw it twice.
Some seven, eight-year-old boy in a dress at a restaurant with his parents.
And they're just all so proud of how loving and accepting and progressive they are.
You know, and if that kid grows up and in all likelihood has the mental issues, the anguish that he's going to have,
and ends up taking his own life as a result because he's so miserable, because he's so confused and so backwards,
you know whose fault it isn't? Mine.
You know whose fault it is? It's that parents. It's that school systems.
It's that godless atheistic school system that encourages that filth and that trash.
You know, and that's, you know, this is what I'm talking about.
The world, they have no hope and they just come up with all this nonsense.
And then when it leads to this inevitable just sacrifice, when lives are just being destroyed,
rather than just owning up to it, they just turn to Israel and say, oh, you're the problem.
No, you're the problem. They're the problem out there.
And notice here at the end there it says, when this happened, you know, they have great indignation against Israel.
It says, and they departed from him and returned to their own land.
And I believe what he's talking about is that when Israel came and saw finally what happened,
I mean, they're just kicking the Moabites' butts and then they see the sacrifice take place.
They just say, all right, we're done.
And they departed from him and went into their own land.
They just finally said, hey, you know what? Enough's enough.
And it kind of reminded me of 1 Timothy 6 where he said, you know, if any man teach otherwise and consent not to wholesome words,
even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the doctrine which is according to godliness, right?
If there's people out there that are not going to, you know, consent to wholesome words,
people that are not going to consent to the doctrine which is according to godliness,
they're going to deny Christ, they're going to deny the Bible, they're going to deny the godliness of Christ,
the godhood of Christ, you know, the Bible, Paul told Timothy, from such, turn away.
He said, from such, turn away.
You know, it's not my job to try to go out there and fix the public school system.
It's not my job to go out there and try to, you know, right every wrong in the world.
The only thing that, you know, we can do is just point people to Christ.
You know, we can show them, hey, here's the blood, here's the water, here's the sacrifice.
You do with it what you want.
You know, and when they, it should surprise us when they start to make,
you know, when they become some hopeless that they start just, you know,
just doing the most abominable things and then lash out against us as if it's our fault.
You know, they did the same thing here to Israel.
You know, when God showed up on Israel's side, you know, and performed a miracle and gave them great victory,
you know, it upset the Moabites, made them mad.
You know, and really, we just need to just understand that, you know,
the people out there, they just need to be pointed to Jesus.
They just need to be pointed to the Lord and kind of left to do with it what they will.
Because, you know, from such you turn away.
You know, he said at the end of 1 Timothy 6 as well that, you know, he said,
oh Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, you know, avoiding profane and vain babblings
and oppositions of science, falsely so called.
When people just get so far gone, when it's just vain babblings, profane and vain babblings,
oppositions of finance, the Bible says that Timothy was told to avoid those things, not engage with it.
You know, and that's what's so silly to me about people who want to just get in these apologetics,
people who just want to get in and just get in these creation ministries
and just make their life all about debating atheists.
That doesn't fix anything.
I mean, I'm sure the exception proves the rule.
I'm sure there's people out there that have had success to some degree.
But what is really going to deliver a whole group of people?
What is, is it sitting there like watching, you know, at the bottom of the wall like yelling at the king,
don't sacrifice your, oh you stop it.
Is it sitting there trying to reason with unreasonable people who just want to argue and debate?
Is that what it is?
Is that what's going to deliver people from certain doom?
No. The only thing that delivers is the blood and the water.
It's the offering that Christ made.
You know, and that's what they need to see.
You know, we need to be like that sun that shines and shows them, hey, here's the blood.
So, let's go ahead and close in a word of prayer.
Dear Lord, again, thank you for this great picture of Christ.
Lord, I know I don't do it justice, Lord, preaching your word.
And, Lord, I pray that you'd help us to see it for ourselves as we read our Bibles this week.
We ask these things in Christ's name, Amen.
Alright, we'll go ahead and sing one more song before we go.
Amen.
Let's turn a little to Psalm number 415.
Psalm number 413, stand up, stand up for Jesus.
Here it is.
Psalm number 413.
Stand up, stand up for Jesus.