(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

1 Samuel chapter 30, if you remember in chapter 29, David had gone out to battle with the Philistines. He was, you know, marching with his troops in the rear ward of all the Philistine troops. And he had told Achish that he was going to fight with the Philistines against the nation of Israel. If we look at everything in David's character, everything he's done before that point and after that point in the Bible, we know that he wasn't really going to fight against the nation of Israel. He was lying to Achish, just like he'd been lying to him in previous chapters, all the time that he was dwelling for 16 months in the land of the Philistines. Well, in chapter 29, if you remember, the lords of the Philistines said, we don't want these Hebrews marching with us. They're going to be an adversary to us in the battle. And they told Achish, you've got to cut this guy loose. And so David and his men leave the army and they go back to Ziklag, which is where they've been living for the last 16 months. Well, in chapter 30, when they get back to Ziklag, after Achish has sent them home and told them you're not going to fight in this battle, when they get back, they find that while they were all gone, there's been an invasion. Look at verse number one of chapter 30. And it came to pass when David and his men were come to Ziklag on the third day, that the Amalekites had invaded the south and Ziklag and smitten Ziklag and burned it with fire. So the Amalekites had come in and attacked his city, burned the place down. And it says in verse two, and then taken the women captives that were there in. They slew not any, either great or small, but carried them away and went on their way. So all the men are gone because all the men had gone away to fight in this battle. So the Amalekites come and there's no men there to protect them. And so all the women and children are taken captives. They're not killed, they're just taken captive, verse three. So David and his men came to the city and behold it was burned with fire. And their wives and their sons and their daughters were taken captives. And David and the people that were with them lifted up their voices, their voice and wept until they had no more power to weep. So you can imagine how upset you'd be. Let's say you went away on a trip. You come home, your house is burned to the ground and your whole family's gone. Your wife's gone, your children are gone. You don't know that they're alive. I mean, we know as reading the Bible thousands of years later, that they're alive and that he's going to recover it all back again. He doesn't know that at the time. He gets there, just imagine this. You get there, your house is burned to the ground and your whole family's gone. You don't know where they are, you don't know. And not just David, but all of his followers, all of his men. So they're lifting up their voices and weeping until they have no more power to weep. I mean, they're very, very upset. It says in verse two, And David's two wives were taken captives, And David was greatly distressed for the people's sake of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters. So everyone is so upset. They began to take it out on David because he's the leader. You, this was your idea to take us all to some battle, leave nobody behind to watch things. And when, and now we've lost everything. So they're talking about putting David to death. So this is a low point. His own followers want to put him to death. He's lost his house. He's lost his family. He doesn't know what he's going to do. Now you have to ask yourself, is this David being punished? Because David has been living a sinful life of late. He's been lying to Achish. He's out of God's will. He's out of the promised land. He's living amongst the Philistines. He's living a lie. He was going to deceive Achish and so forth. And Achish had really been nothing but nice to him. But he's going to deceive him and go fight against Israel and so forth. Say he's going to fight against Israel when really he wasn't. So David is going through a hard time now. Probably God's getting his attention. Probably God's punishing him for being disobedient in recent years. But look at the end here. It says, you know, he's very distressed. But at the end of verse 6 it says, But David encouraged himself and the Lord his God. And sometimes when you're going through the hardest times, whether it's something that you brought upon yourself, which in this case David kind of did bring it upon himself. He put himself in a bad position. If he hadn't have gone to the Philistines, this never would have happened. But even if you brought it upon yourself, it doesn't make it any better. In fact, it makes it worse when you realize, hey, I've done this to myself. That makes it even harder. That makes it worse. And sometimes when you're going through the hardest time, you're not going to have people around you to encourage you. And David's followers are definitely not encouraging him. They're talking about killing him. And that's why the Bible says, David encouraged himself and the Lord his God. And sometimes when you're at the lowest point, Jesus has to encourage you. You have to go to the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, and the Word of God to encourage you. Because there's just nobody going to be there to encourage you. That's why you need to make sure that, you know, you know where to go when you're having a hard time is not go to the bottle or not go to your friends always. Sometimes you've got to just go to God and pray and seek his face. And that's exactly what David did. He encouraged himself and the Lord his God. It says in verse 7, And David said to Abiathar the priest of the Himalayan sun, I pray thee, bring me hither the Ephod. And Abiathar brought thither the Ephod to David. And this is like a priestly garment is what this Ephod is. And it says, And David inquired at the Lord, saying, Shall I pursue after this troop? Shall I overtake them? And he answered him, pursue, for thou shalt surely overtake them, and without fail recover all. So in David's time of distress, he has nowhere to turn to. He doesn't have any friends to turn to. He turns to the Lord. He encourages himself and the Lord. And he prays to God and asks him, Should I go after these people? Am I going to catch up to them? Because he doesn't know where they went, how far away they are. Can he catch them? And God answers him and tells him, Yes, pursue, for thou shalt surely overtake them. And listen to this promise, And without fail recover all. That's encouraging when he heard that. So David went, he and the 600 men that were with him, and came to the Baruch Bessor, where those that were left behind stayed. But David pursued, he and 400 men, for 200 abode behind, which were so faint that they could not go over the Baruch Bessor. So they're going on this forced march. Because remember, they're trying to catch up to an enemy that's fleeing away. So they're in a big hurry. Well, in the midst of this grueling marching, and traveling at a very fast speed, walking, running, whatever it was, probably just walking all day and all night, whatever it was. Basically, when they get to the Baruch Bessor, there are 200 people that just can't go any further. They're just too faint. They don't have the endurance to keep going. And it's not that they didn't want to. The Bible says they were so faint that they could not go over the Baruch Bessor. So they're left behind. The 400 that are still feeling good, that can still keep going forward, they continue with David. Now look at verse 11. And they found an Egyptian in the field, and brought him to David, and gave him bread, and he did eat, and they made him drink water. Now, it says, And they gave him a cake of figs, and two clusters of raisins. And when he had eaten, his spirit came again to him. For he had eaten no bread, nor drunk any water, three days and three nights. And David said to him, To whom belongest thou, and whence art thou? And he said, I am a young man of Egypt, servant to an Amalekite. Now who was it that had invaded Ziklag while David was gone? The Amalekites. They find this guy out in the field that is really, you know, just worn out, and sick, and hungry, and hasn't eaten or drunk, and so they give him something to eat, something to drink. They ask him who he is, turns out he's a servant to an Amalekite. And he says, My master left me, end of verse 13, because three days ago I fell sick. We made an invasion upon the south of the Karathites, and upon the coast which belongeth to Judah. Yeah, no kidding. You know, that's where they were invaded. And it says, And upon the south of Caleb, and we burned Ziklag with fire. So this guy is one of the enemies that actually burned down David's house, and his men's houses, and all their stuff, and took them all captive. The only reason that he's not still with the group is because the Bible says that he got sick. And so because he was sick, they didn't want him to slow them down. They're trying to flee, they're trying to get away. So they say, Hey, if you're sick, we're going to have to just leave you here. And that's why they just left him out in the wilderness. David said to him, Canst thou bring me down to this company? So he's basically asking him to give information to help him defeat this enemy. Basically show me where they're hiding, show me which way they went, help bring me down to that company. And he said, Swear unto me by God, that thou wilt neither kill me, nor deliver me into the hands of my master, and I'll bring thee down to this company. Because of course he knows that if he's delivered to his master, his master is going to kill him since he just led the enemy into their camp. Now what's interesting about this is that you don't see David torturing this guy to try to figure out what he knows. Now actually at the end of verse 11 where it says they made him drink water, if you go back to the Hebrew, it actually means they waterboarded him. Okay, no, I'm just kidding. They would have. You know, you don't see him being tortured here. And today we in America are being told by a lot of people, Hey, we need to torture enemy combatants. And what's interesting is this is what they'll say. Well, people that are not American citizens, they don't have our rights. Have you ever heard people say like, Hey, they're not citizens, they don't have our rights. And I've even heard people say this, Let's not give them our rights. Have you ever, who's ever heard something like that? Hey, we're not going to give them our rights. Now the question is, where do our rights come from? You know, I mean, even according to our own country's laws. And look, I'll be, I'll be frank with you. The constitution of our country is not perfect at all. This law is perfect. This is the real constitution right here, the Bible. The constitution and the Declaration of Independence are both flawed documents. They're not perfect. However, they are the law of the land. They are the founding documents of our nation and our government. And we're supposed to, you know, be subject under the powers that be. We're supposed to live under the laws of our nation. And in the constitution, the Declaration of Independence is spelled out a truth that all men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights. So who gives us our rights according to our founding document of our nation? God. They're endowed to us by our creator, okay. God is the one who gives us our rights, okay. It's not a government that says, you know what, we're going to give you the privilege of being alive. And, and remember, he said among these rights are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, it says in the Declaration of Independence. We have hereby granted you the privilege of pursuing happiness and living and being at liberty. No, that's something that's given to us by God. We're given life by God. We're given liberty by God. Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. And so our rights were not granted on us by some government who loves us and they decided to let us exist and let us, you know, raise our children. And they're even going to give us the freedom of speech and we can actually say what we want to say. No, God's the one who told us that we can say what needs to be said. I don't need their permission to have the freedom of religion. This book gives me the permission to serve God and to worship him in holiness and in truth, in spirit and in truth. So our rights don't come from government, they come from God. So to sit there and say, well, if you're not a citizen, these rights don't apply to you. So wait a minute, did God only give rights to citizens of America? I mean, it doesn't make any sense. If citizens are the ones who have rights, then that means the rights came from government. If all men are created with rights, then those rights came from God. So to sit there and say, well, these rights in the Bill of Rights, they only apply to American citizens. There's no wording like that in the Constitution whatsoever that says like, hey, citizens have the right to free speech. Citizens have the right to freedom of religion. And in the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution, look, I'm not saying I agree with everything in the Constitution, but the Constitution is the law. It's the law of the land. Whether we agree with it or not, that's what we live under. That's our system. And in the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution, it says that excessive fines shall not be imposed, neither cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. So the Constitution very clearly says in the Bill of Rights that cruel and unusual punishments shall not be inflicted. Now, it doesn't say upon whom. It doesn't say it shall not be inflicted on certain people. It just says they're not going to be inflicted, period. That means they're not going to be inflicted on anyone. Now, the death penalty is not a cruel and unusual punishment. Number one, there's nothing unusual about it. At the time that that document was written, people were being put to death all the time for all kinds of crimes, much more so than today. And in fact, the Constitution itself makes reference to the death penalty in the section under treason. And so if the Constitution itself is mandating the death penalty, how can somebody say, well, the death penalty is not constitutional because it's cruel and unusual? They must not have thought so since it was mandated earlier in the document. So cruel and unusual punishments, you say, well, what's cruel and unusual? You know, I don't see anything unusual about strapping somebody to a table, you know, slanted upside down and simulating like they're drowning and pouring water up their nose and holding their, you know, okay, do you think that's not unusual? Sounds unusual to me. Okay, and cruelty. Obviously, we know what cruelty means. It's somebody who harms someone else just for the joy of watching them suffer. They basically are doing something that's intended to cause pain just for the sake of causing pain. Now, obviously, you know, that would be torturing someone would be cruel and unusual punishment. Now, some people will say, well, that's not a punishment. Torture is not a punishment. You're just trying to get information out of them. Well, here's what it is. You tell the person, give me your information. They say, no. Okay, now I'm going to torture you. That's the punishment. That's the punishment for not telling the information. So it is a punishment. Okay, now, is it biblical? No. You cannot, you can read the whole Bible. And look, the Bible has 31,000 verses in it, some odd. It talks a lot about a lot of different subjects. It covers warfare. It covers captivity, hostages. It covers every subject that you can find. You're never going to find in the Bible, God talking about torturing. People are telling God, except when he's doing the torturing. It's called hell. But he never gives us the job of torturing people. Part of the reason for that is that every government throughout history who has ever tortured people ended up torturing their own people. Whether it's the USSR or People's Republic of China or go down the list of evil dictatorships, they always turned it on their own people. And that's exactly what you see happening in our country right now. Because for a long time, they're talking about how we need to be torturing the terrorists. And we need to torture them and waterboard them 169 times. And there was a guy that was waterboarded 170 times or some crazy thing. And for a long time, they're saying, hey, we need to torture the terrorists. But then now, just in the past few weeks, they're coming out with all this legislation saying that US citizens can now be the terrorists. And then they say the war on terror now is global, including Tempe. So according to them, Tempe is a battlefield of the war on terror. According to this new legislation, that just the whole world is the battlefield. And the enemy is every extremist element in whatever. And they have this new homegrown terror. And it's extremism that's among US citizens. Now really, it's just the same thing they've already been doing. But now they're just starting to make the distinction of, well, hey, US citizen or non-US citizen shouldn't matter. Well, I agree that it shouldn't matter. Except that I think nobody should be tortured. They think torture everybody. Let's not discriminate here. Let's not discriminate. Let's just torture everybody. I say don't torture anybody. Because number one, it's not biblical. And God gave us all these rules. He gave us punishments of, for example, death penalty for extreme capital crimes. And then he gave punishments that are financial punishments. And then he gave a punishment of a beating. But see, a beating is not torture. The difference between a beating and torture, beating is a punishment where, OK, you're going to get 39 strikes. Or you're going to get 20 strikes. But then it's over. And it's not like if you cooperate, you'll get 10. But if you don't make me go to 20, that's torture. That's the difference. When it's just a set punishment that just says, hey, you're going to feel pain because you've broken the law. Here's your punishment for what you've done. These are people who are not being punished for a law that they broke. They're being tortured that they might give information about the enemy, because they're part of the enemy, supposedly. So number one, it's not biblical. Never found in the Bible. And in this example, we see very clearly that David had an enemy combatant in his custody. This guy is clearly an enemy that has kidnapped his family. And again, instead of torturing him to give him the information, he gives him food. He gives him something to drink. He's overcoming evil with good. He's showing kindness unto his enemy. He's loving his enemy. He's doing good to him, feeding him. And the Bible says, it's that enemy hunger feed him. Oh, but you don't understand what this enemy is like. I'm sure there's so much. I mean, these Amalekites were some pretty gnarly people, too. God wanted them all wiped out. God was upset that Saul didn't kill them all. That's how bad they were. And yet even this gnarliest enemy is shown a little bit of compassion. And David is able to overcome evil with good. Obviously, not everyone's going to respond to this type of treatment. Some people, you can be nice to them. You can do everything for them. And they're incorrigible. They're in reprobate. But many people, have you ever heard the expression, you catch more flies with honey? Being nice to people sometimes can work. And you say, well, what if that doesn't work? Well, then you know what? We can do what's right in the eyes of God and then trust in the Lord to protect us. Instead of taking it in our own hands and saying, well, God can't protect us, let's torture everybody. And we'll keep torturing them until somebody tells us something that we need to know. Those are some reasons why it's not right to torture people. The other thing is that when someone's being tortured, they'll pretty much say anything to stop the torture. So therefore, a lot of the information that you get out of people when you torture them is not accurate. Because people are just making stuff up just to tell something really juicy, to make it seem like I've told everything. They're telling stuff that's not even true. I mean, it's a fact that people confess to things that they didn't even do when they're tortured. Yes, I did it. They didn't even do it. Because they just want the torture to stop. So if they don't know anything, they're going to have to make something up in order to stop the torture. So you get a lot of false information. But not only that, who's going to do the torturing? What kind of a sick person are you when that's your job? So what do you do for a living? Oh, I torture people. Usually I spend my morning waterboarding people. And then I beat people with a truncheon. Then I have coffee. And it's going to turn you, even if you're a normal person going into it, you're going to turn into a pretty sick, twisted individual by the time you've been a professional torturer. One time I met this girl, and she was going into the military to become an interrogator. And I said to her, can you just do me a favor and just not torture anybody? She got really mad and didn't want to talk to me anymore. But I mean, what kind of a job is that for a woman? I mean, it's bad enough for a man to be a professional interrogator and torturer. But I mean, when you're a woman, that's not the one that you want to take home to mom. Just a little advice to young men. But anyway, he's nice to this guy. He feeds him. He takes care of him. He gives him something to drink. And look, I'd rather just do what's right in the sight of God and let the chips fall where they may. I'm not going to sit there and hold somebody's feet to the fire. That is not biblical. OK? I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to waterboard anybody. I'm not going to have anything to do with it or promote it. Because it's not biblical. It's not right. And I'm all for the death penalty. I'm all for punishing criminals. But I'm not for torturing people to get information out of them. That's not biblical. That's something that the Nazis would do or the Soviets would do. That should not be what America represents. And the founders of our country, that's why they put that in the Bill of Rights. Yep. And everybody's really focused on the First Amendment and the Second Amendment. And a lot of times, they overlook some of these other important things, like about the cruel and unusual punishments. That goes right over their head. But it's there for a reason. It's important. And so he gets this guy to give him all the information. David swears unto him, hey, I won't turn you in. I won't do anything bad to you. I'm going to feed you and clothe you and take care of you. And he gives him the information. He brings him into the company. And it says in verse 16, when he had brought him down, behold, they were spread abroad upon all the earth, eating and drinking and dancing, because of all the great spoil that they've taken out of the land of the Philistines and the land of Judah. So they're all excited and partying because they robbed everybody and took all the spoil. And David smote them from the twilight, even of the evening of the next day. So how long is that? 24 hours. 24 hours he's smiting them and chasing after them. And it says in their escape, not a man of them saved 400 young men which rode upon camels and fled. So the 400 guys on camels got away. Everybody else got slaughtered. And David recovered all that the Amalekites had carried away. And David rescued his two wives. And so getting sick, think about this for a minute. That guy getting sick was the best thing that ever happened to him. Because if he hadn't got sick, every single man got slaughtered. He wasn't one of those young guys on the camel, because he was a servant. He wasn't somebody that's important, that's riding on one of the camels. And so he would have been slaughtered. What can we learn from this? Sometimes bad things happen in our life. And we think they're bad, but they're actually good. I don't know about you, but I hate being sick. I hate being sick. You just feel so helpless. At least you have other problems in your life. Let's say you have a financial problem. You feel like, OK, I can figure this out. I can go make some extra money. I can do something. Or whatever the problem may be. But when you're sick, there's nothing you can do. I mean, it's not like a physical enemy that you can grab hold of and defeat. It's this microscopic enemy that you can't defeat. It's inside you. And so I don't know about you, but I hate being sick more than anything. And when I get sick, I mean, I get down. I get in heaviness. And it makes me depressed to be sick. I just don't like it. And it just makes me very sorrowful to be sick. Well, yet, maybe sometimes when we're sick, God has a reason for us being sick that could be to our benefit or to the benefit of someone else. I was just sick a few days ago. And I was sick for several days. I wasn't having any fun. But who knows? Maybe it was just somebody needed to hear Brother Dave's sermon that he preached on Sunday night. Or maybe there was something else going on. Maybe I would have been in the wrong place. Or maybe God was protecting me from something. I don't know. But for whatever reason, God allows me Sometimes when I'm sick, depending on how sick I am, sometimes when I'm sick, I'll do extra Bible reading or something that I wouldn't have normally done just because I'm laid up. I'm just stuck in bed. So I might do some extra read or get something else done that I was going to do. Sometimes it causes you to have to slow down and relax and think about things and so forth. Sometimes I've been so sick that I can't even read. And I can't figure out why God has done that to me. But I'm sure that there's a reason why it happens. And this is part of life. But don't get depressed always when bad things happen. And maybe it's not sickness. Maybe it's a problem on your job. Or maybe a big financial catastrophe. And we all find ourselves just saying, Why? Why is this happening? But this guy would have been dead if he hadn't been sick. And this guy was very sick. He's so sick that he has to be dropped off in the wilderness. And he doesn't eat. He doesn't drink for three days. And so it's a good thing he got sick. Saved his life. And he got to know David. And hopefully he got saved. Hopefully he got around the children of Israel here and heard the Gospel and so forth. So sometimes things that happen in our life. The Bible says, We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are on the call according to His purpose. So this guy getting sick was the best thing that ever happened because everybody else got killed. It says in verse number 20, And David took all the flocks and the herds which they drained before those other cattle and said, This is David's foils. So everybody got their wives back, their children back, and they got all their cattle and possessions back. But then also the Amalekites had some of their own cattle. So David takes that cattle that belonged to the Amalekites and said, This is David's foils. So he takes that for himself. Everybody else gets their stuff back. Now in verse 21 it says, And David came to the two hundred men, which were so faint that they could not follow David, whom they made also to abide at the Brook Bessor. And they went forth to meet David and to meet the people that were with him. And when David came near to the people, he saluted them. So David comes back with his four hundred troops to the two hundred guys. Remember they were just so faint they could not cross the Brook Bessor. And when he gets them, David salutes them, and he's happy to see them and everything. But watch this, verse 22, Then answered all the wicked men and men of Belial of those that went with David. Now stop right there. Wicked men and men of Belial that went with David? That means that in David's group of six hundred men, and even in the four hundred, there were wicked men and men of Belial. Now in previous lessons, earlier in 1 Samuel, we talked a lot about that term, sons of Belial, or children of Belial. And Belial, you say, what is Belial? Okay, think about this. Bel, Bel, Belial, Bel. Remember Bel in the land of Babylon? I think it's Isaiah chapter number 46, 1, or somewhere around there where it talks about Bel, bow it down, Nebo's stupid. Bel was a false god that they worsted in Babylon. Bel is the name of a lot of false gods. Beelzebub, Bel, Belial, whatever you want to call it. This is talking about children of Satan. And I've gone through in the Bible, in previous lessons where we talked about how these are reprobates, is what these are. If you look at every mention of son of Belial, it's somebody who's a reprobate. Because every unsafe person is not a child of the devil. You become a child of the devil when you're reprobate, when you're twofold more the child of hell than others, and then you become a son of Belial. And you look at son of Belial in the Bible, it's usually sodomites, it's serial adulterers, and just really bad people that that term is used about. The sons of Belial, the children of Belial. So basically, David has some guys like this in his group. Look at 2 Peter 2, keep your finger there in 1 Samuel. We're almost done, but flip over to 2 Peter toward the end of the New Testament. It says in 2 Peter 2, he says in verse 1, I'm in 1 Peter, 2 Peter 2 verse 1, the Bible reads, but there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be, not might be, not they might be there, shall be false teachers among you, who privily or secretly shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bringing upon themselves swift destruction. And he goes on, I'm not going to read the whole chapter, but if you compare 2 Peter 2 with the parallel passage in Jude, where he also talks about false teachers and false prophets among you, he talks about how they have eyes full of adultery that cannot cease from sin. He also brings up Sodom and Gomorrah, and he says likewise these also defile the flesh, like unto the way they did in Sodom and Gomorrah. So he's talking about people who are very wicked, very perverted, very evil, they're false teachers, they're wolves in sheep's clothing, they're adulterers and adulteresses that creep into a church, and he said they will be among you. Not they might be, they will be. Jesus had one in his church, Judas Iscariot. Judas Iscariot, the son of Perdition. David had these sons of Belial. So what can we learn from this? That there will always be, no matter how righteous of a leader you are, there are always going to be wicked people and sons of Belial. So you can't just implicitly trust everyone around you, and say here, let my kids spend the night at your house, and here, watch my children, and here, do this and do that. You can't just trust everybody. You shouldn't go around suspecting everybody being on a witch hunt, but at the same time, you shouldn't be so naive to think, well, if someone goes to church at Faithful or Baptist, they must love God. Anybody who goes to church at Faithful or Baptist Church is a righteous Christian who loves God. That is not true, because there will be infiltrators among us. It's not our job to try to unmask them, or figure out who they are, although I think I have an idea. Anyway, you doesn't know, I don't want to give any hints, but it's whoever I dip this off and hand it to in a minute. But anyway, I'm just saying that they're going to be there. Just know that they're going to be there. And God's trying to show us this over and over with Judas, now with David. There are going to be children of Belial among us. Look what the children of Belial and the wicked men say. Because they went not with us, we will not give them all of the spoil that we have recovered, save to every man, his wife, and his children, that they may lead them away and depart. So they're saying, hey, wait a minute. These guys didn't go with us to the battle. Therefore, they don't get the spoil. Now, David is upset about this. He doesn't agree with that. Then said, David, ye shall not do so, my brethren, with that which the Lord had given us, who had preserved us and delivered the company that came against us into our own. For who will hearken unto you in this matter? Bunch of sons of Belial, that's who. But as his part is, they goeth down to the battle. So shall his part be that tarryeth by the stuff, they shall part alike. And it was so from that day forward that he made it a statute and an ordinance of Israel unto this day. That's an important teaching. Because not only was it just a one-time thing where David made this pronouncement, the Bible makes it clear that everybody who was against this philosophy were wicked people. We see that the righteous people would not stand with them. David and all the righteous men said, no. We all part alike. The wicked men were the ones saying, well, they didn't go to the battle. They get nothing. And number two, it's important because in the next verse, it says that from that day forward, he made it a statute and an ordinance for Israel unto this day. And when it says unto this day in the Bible, it doesn't mean unto 2011. It means unto the day that this book was being physically penned down, the book of 1 Samuel, just to make that clear. Because there are a lot of times that that phrase is used in the Bible. Doesn't mean to today. But some people think it does. That's why I say that. But anyway, how can we apply this today? Well, there are a lot of applications for this. You have to understand that there's a team. And just as the local church is a body with many different members in it, and the Bible makes it clear that one member is not more important than the other, all members are necessary. The ear is not more important than the eye or vice versa. They're both needed. OK. And so some people have physical abilities that other people do not. Now, it's not that these 200 men didn't want to fight. They really did the best they could. I mean, they marched hard. They pushed themselves. But they got to a point where they just couldn't go any further. The body has limitations. And they were not able to do it. But they were still part of the team. And it's the same thing with the local church. We should be a team. And we should have a team attitude, not an attitude of I'm better than everyone else. And I'm the most important one. And I'm doing so much more than so-and-so. Now, different people are in different stages of life. And they can do more or less for God. OK. For example, let's say someone is physically disabled. Or someone is not well. Or someone is elderly. They're probably not going to be able to go out and do the eight-hour soloing marathons with us, the small-town marathons, where we go out soloing all day for eight hours. And we're going up and down hills and everything. That doesn't make them any less of a Christian. We should look down at them and say, oh, man, what? Am I going for one hour, grandma? Just because you're 90. No, come on. Keep up with me. Because that would be stupid, wouldn't it? And people go through different phases of life. OK. If somebody is ill or somebody is not well. And for example, women. I mean, if ladies give birth, if they give birth to a child, the Bible talks about how there's going to be a recovery period after giving birth to a child. The Bible talks about a 30-some day, if it's a boy, and 60-some-odd days for a girl, that the body might recover. Because giving birth is such a major physical activity that it takes so much out of your body and there's so much energy required and strain on the body. And then also, the body just has to go through a process of going back to normal. And it takes a few months just to even get back to normal. And so a lot of times, ladies will be in bed for a long time and just having to really take it easy and rest the body after giving birth to children. Or mothers who have to nurse their children. They might have to nurse their child every hour or every 45 minutes or whatever. And so they're maybe not going to be able to do all the same stuff as a young single guy who is working 25 hours a week. When you're a young single guy and you work 25 hours a week, you're probably going to have more time for soul-winning than, say, a guy who's working 60 hours a week. And he's got a family. He's got kids. He's got responsibilities. You're probably going to have more time for soul-winning than a woman who's nursing a newborn. He's going to be able to go out and so forth. And so there are different people that have different abilities, different situations. Or even just, let's say, there's a guy, a married man, who's working 80 hours a week and a married man who's working 40 hours a week. They're not going to have the same free time. They're not going to have the same amount of time for soul-winning and everything like that. Now, I believe everybody should be out soul-winning. I believe that that's what we all should be doing. That should be something that is a priority to us. But I think it's according to every man's ability. Because some people have a lot of free time. They should be doing a lot of soul-winning and doing a lot, and not just soul-winning, but a lot of Bible reading, a lot of prayer, a lot of other things for church. And doing something with their life. Other people are going to have less to give. And the Bible says that if at first there be a willing heart, it is accepted according to that a man hath, not according to that he hath not. It's just like if somebody's a multi-millionaire and they throw in $10 in the plate, God's not jumping up and down about that. But if somebody who has a lot less money throws in $10 of extra, let's say they give their tithe and they throw in an extra $10 or something, that's something that was a sacrifice for them. Now, other people might be able to throw down $10,000 and they don't even miss it. They spilled that much. I mean, to them, $10,000 is just like something that they won't even bend down to pick it up off the ground. I'm exaggerating, but anyway. For some people, it's harder to give $10 than it is to give $10,000 for some people. So God doesn't look down at financial giving and say, you know, I'm just looking for the biggest number, or I'm looking for the most hours out working for God. You know, he looks at what you have, he looks at who you are. And so some people are able to do more than others. We shouldn't look down on somebody who gave it their best shot, but their physical body's collapsing from exhaustion. They can't cross the book Bishor and say, well, you get nothing. You do not part a life. So I think that this could be a thing for, you know, rewards in heaven, too. I don't think God's going to say, you know, well, because you, you know, lived in a country where you had to work 100 hours a week in a sweatshop, you didn't get to go soul winning as much as the people over in America who had a lot more free time. So therefore, you know, you're going to the back of the line for rewards. I think God is going to take some of that into consideration. Okay. But not only that, the team attitude is something we said. That's why, for example, you know, when we go out soul winning as a group, I like to just count up how many of the group got saved. You know what I mean? Like, and not just, well, I got this many saved, you know, and I went out, you know, for four hours and I had three people saved and this group had zero saved. But you know what? I just look at it. If one group had three people saved and another group had zero saved and another group had one saved, you know, I would just add all that up and just say, this is how many our church got saved. Amen. Because it doesn't really matter whether I got him saved or you got him saved or somebody else. Who is Paul? Who is a Paulist? But ministers by whom he believed, even as the Lord gave to every man. It doesn't matter whether I got him saved, whether you got him saved, whether she got him saved. All that matters is that they got saved. Okay. It doesn't matter who. And you know what? The guy who had zero saved, he might've been working just as hard. Preaching the gospel just as hard, knocking just as many doors. He wasn't hanging at the donut shop or something. He was knocking doors. He was trying to knock. And maybe he was just talking to people who maybe they're going to get saved down the road. Maybe he's just planting a seed. Or maybe he was just warning people and just trying his best. Now look, if you're going out week after week and just keep having zero saved, then something's wrong with your soul in it. Because he that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing a sheath with him. So if you're never having anybody saved, you have a problem. But you're not going to get people saved every time. You're not going to get people saved every week. Some days you're going to get people saved. Some days you're going to go out for hour after hour and get no one saved. But you can't just sit there and say, well, I went out and had nobody saved. And he got people saved. You know, it doesn't matter who got the people saved. It's we were all out there working. We're all out there serving God. And we have a result. And look, the only reason that on Sunday nights and Wednesday nights, let me just explain this real quick. The only reason that on Sunday nights and Wednesday nights we tally up the salvations and have people raise their hand, do you know why we do that for one reason? So that we can count them. Does everybody understand that? There's only one reason why we do that. To count. Because there is no other accurate way to count. I mean, if we went around and talked to everybody or people are writing on slips of paper and turning it, it's all going to get lost. You're going to lose it. I'm going to lose it. We're all together in a group. So we ask about the soul winning so that we can all rejoice together and so that we can count the number. That's all. It's not, you know, look at me, everybody. That's not what it's about. That's why you'll often see somebody, when we'll go out in a big group and we'll count it up in demand or whatever and say, hey, it's a total of seven. When I get up here, I'll just say, hey, you know, this group, we had a total of seven saved. Who else had somebody saved? Because we're just trying to get to the total. We're not trying to sit there and make a big show about it. Now, you know, we're not ashamed. Like, you know, I had two saved. You know, I had two saved, you know. No, I mean, hey, we're rejoicing about it. But I'm just saying, it's about the team. You know what I mean? If you're going out there and you're a silent partner, and I think this is the best illustration. A lot of times, I'll say to someone in our church who was a silent partner, I'll say, hey, how many people did you guys get saved? Well, you know, he got one person saved. I didn't get anybody saved. It's like, wait a minute. You know, you're part of that team. And I don't think that there's any, you know, he's saying here, the one who stays by the stuff gets the same reward as the one who went to battle. I think that God is saying, you know, when you go out two by two and one person's doing the talking, I think both people are part of that team. And both people are putting in the works. Both people are walking down the street, knocking the doors. And the person who's doing the talking, the other person's praying that the person will receive the gospel. And they're important too. And maybe they can help counter distractions and so forth. And so don't ever disdain the silent partner or being a silent partner. If I go out as a silent partner with somebody and my partner gets three or four people saved, you know, in a day's work. And I didn't talk to any of those people. I was just, so long as the silent partner, I'd walk away saying, we got four people saved. I don't walk away saying, well, I didn't even need to be there. I mean, I'm just, you know, a third wheel here. What do I, what am I needed? I might as well have not even been there. Well, you know what? That person that you were with might have not even gone, except you were with them. Because maybe there wouldn't have been enough pairs and so forth. So a lot of people, they don't go as a silent partner because they say, well, I'm not going to do the talking anyway. So I'm just not going to go. Well, that's a foolish attitude because even if you're just saying, look, I'm not going to do any talking. I'm just going as a silent partner. You are serving God. You're an important part of that equation. And God's going to reward you for going soul winning and for souls being saved because you were a part of that team. Because he ordained sending him out in team of two by two. He did that. We got that idea from him. Does everybody understand what I'm saying? And so being a silent partner is important. It's not just, oh, you're along for the ride. You're the little sidekick or whatever. Now, you're an important part of that team right there. And you're learning. Also, maybe you're new to soul winning. Being a silent partner is a way for you to learn and to watch it done and to get better. But just even if you've been soul winning for years and you're a silent partner, if I go out and have four people saved and I have my partner with me, I'm going to say, hey, look, we got these people saved. And get that attitude. Get an attitude like that. That was David's attitude. Hey, we won this battle. And look, these 200 guys that were so faint, they didn't serve zero function. They stayed by the stuff. Because they had these 200 guys with them, they were able to leave some of their stuff behind that would have slowed them down. Because they had somebody to watch the stuff. So because someone was able to watch the stuff, they were able to pursue better, fight better, do more. And so there was a function that they were performing. Therefore, they should get paid as well. And so being a silent partner is a great example of this. Just being a part of the team, looking at it as, what did we as a church accomplish, not just looking at it as, so and so, superstar, soul winner, and blah, blah, blah. We don't want to lift up individuals as much as we want to lift up God. He's the one who's doing the work. So we don't want to just glorify Pastor Anderson or glorify you. We just want to get the work done. And we want everybody to be involved. And hey, if somebody's doing a ton of extra soul winning, great. And if they're going every single day, that's awesome. And the more people they're getting saved, the better. But you know what? I want everybody to be involved today. Not just a couple of superstars. I want everybody to be doing it. I don't want to be a superstar. I want everybody to be doing it, and everybody to be out there serving God, and everybody to feel like they're a part of the team, and not to feel like, well, I can't measure up to Pastor or I can't measure up to Brother so and so. You know, hey, get in the team. Do as much as you can. If you're too faint to do as much, do up to the point that you can do. And that's all God expects of you. And that's all that He wants you to do, is just to do your best. You know, and my best isn't different than your best. And everybody's best is different. And so just to quickly finish up here, David then, it says in verse number 26, when David came to Ziklat, he sent of the spoil unto the elders of Judah, even to his friends, saying, behold a present for you of the spoil of the enemies of the Lord. So, remember how he got all his stuff back? But then remember that other cattle that belonged to the Amalekites, and he said, this is David's spoil? He takes all that stuff, and he sends it to his friends in Judah. Why? Well, in chapter 31, we're going to read how Saul is killed. Well, that's happening at the same time as the events in chapter 30. So he's ready to go back to Judah now. Now that Saul's dead, Saul's not trying to kill him anymore. So he wants to kind of make people happy to see him. And so when you're going back to a place you haven't been in a while, that's why I'm sending a gift on ahead, kind of like Jacob did with Esau, where he sent all the gifts ahead. He's kind of doing this to pave the way for his return. So he sends him this gift of the spoil of the enemies of the Lord. So again, a bad thing that happened to David. Nobody wants to get their house burned down, and their family kidnapped. But it works out for good, because he ends up getting everything back. He gets some additional goods that he's able to send as a present, so that in the next few chapters, the men of Judah are going to welcome him back with open arms, and they're going to want him to be their king, and so forth. He sent it to all these different places in the land of Judah. Verse 31, after he goes through that big list, he says, And to them which were in Hebron, and to all the places where David himself and his men were wont to haunt. Now that's the word that, remember, Saul would use about David. He's always haunting, and he's lurking, and all this stuff. So he's on the run from the law, so that's what it means to haunt. So let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for your work, and for the examples, and thank you for the rights that you've given us, and the freedoms you've given us. Thank you that we can say, as the Apostle Paul said, that we were free born, and that we were born, and we were created in your image, and that you gave us free will and liberty, and thank you for that. And please just help us to get a biblical viewpoint on so many things. Help us to look at the church biblically, as a team, and not think, well, since I'm not the pastor, I'm not important, or well, since I'm not the piano player, I'm not important. Help us to realize that we're all important parts of the team, no matter who we are, no matter what stage of life we're in, we are an important part of the team. Help us to get a biblical outlook on politics. Just help us to get everything we believe, and think, and all of our opinions from your Word. And in Jesus' name, we pray.