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Please bless him tonight as he preaches your word on to us in Jesus name pray. Amen Amen okay, we're continuing this evening with the book of 1st Samuel and we are in chapter 19 tonight and essentially, the the what's going on here is we're gonna see the deterioration of Saul's mind and how Saul is just simply waxing worse and Worse getting further away from God and becoming far more envious and scared Afraid of David if you remember in chapter 18, we see that his envy begins when they begin to give David acclamation for successes That he can't necessarily validate whether they were true or not They were they were crediting David with tens of thousands of slaughters and they're only accredited him with thousands and it becomes insecure With his leadership, but he kind of takes it out on David. And so David becomes the target of His his envy and his bitterness and he becomes afraid of him because of the fact that he knows in his heart That God is with David. You know, the Lord is David is behaving himself wisely. He is doing that which is pleasing in the sight of the Lord He is expanding the kingdom so to speak. He's fighting the Lord's battles and he's above reproach, you know There's nothing that David is doing from his perspective or from his side that is threatening to Saul You know, David is very loyal to Saul He has a great relationship with Saul's son Jonathan All of this is just in Saul's mind, you know the envy and the imaginations and the insecurities They all stem from things that are going on in his mind and really it's a result of him Strain from God not having the Spirit of God not having discernment You know and actually having the evil spirit from the Lord come upon him and trouble him And so, you know obviously having the evil spirit upon him You know causes him to be insecure Causes him to become envious and even to the point where he wants to murder and kill David and so on and so forth and so here we're gonna look at the Deterioration, excuse me of Saul's mind and how he wants to kill David here. Look at verse number one We're gonna look at the plot to assassinate David and how Saul's bitterness increases in verse number one It says in Saul spake to Jonathan his son and so all his servants that they should kill David. So he's trying to conspire He's trying to conspire against David and destroy him and he's kind of sharing these plans with Jonathan is sharing his plans with with the servants and who knows how this conversation is going, you know I'm sure the servants and Jonathan are thinking to themselves like what is David done? You know, what what what fault is he? Is there not a cause? But we obviously see that Saul is just simply afraid of him because he knows he's gonna be replaced The evil spirit is upon him. Now. We're gonna look at Jonathan's benevolence is extended in verse number two It says but Jonathan Saul's son delighted much in David and Jonathan told David saying Saul my father's seeking to kill thee now Therefore I pray thee take heed to thyself into the morning and abide in a secret place and hide thyself And I will go out and stand beside my father in the field where thou art and I will commune with my father of thee And what I see that I will tell thee so Jonathan is being a loyal friend He doesn't want David to die He doesn't want David to be destroyed and he's essentially seen that his dad is just going Taking a turn for the worse to the point where he's plotting to kill him and he tells David look just hide somewhere and take He to thyself. Okay, and a principle that we can learn here specifically Regarding Jonathan's counsel to David is the fact that he says take heed to thyself, right? You know, we see that in the New Testament where the Apostle Paul tells Timothy give heed unto thyself into the doctrine and he's basically telling them like hey you need to take care of yourself Spiritually, right and you know at the end of the day we can't control the actions of other people Maybe the other the actions of other people their thoughts against us, you know, they're unjust They're ungodly or they wrong us, but you know, we can't control what people do people have their own will they have their own volition They have their own choices to make and we can't control what they do You say what can we control well given heat unto ourselves? We just need to make sure that we put ourselves in the right position And the right place to be blessed of God to be protected of God. We can't necessarily Control what other people do right? And so David can't control what Saul's doing He can't control the fact that he's just losing his mind He can't control that Saul wants to kill him But what he can control is his walk with God what he can control is given heat unto himself Making sure that he continues to walk wisely that he loves the Lord because that in itself will secure David's safety Okay, and that's a principle for us to learn that we shouldn't worry what other people may do unto us. We shouldn't even worry what? Principalities and magistrates and mayors and governors and presidents can do because we can't control What they do you understand all we can do is take heat unto ourselves, right? We can't it's not worth losing our minds for what's going on in the world today in the political system With the president with all these things that are taking place We can't control those things and let me just say this is that you know You shouldn't give yourself to paying attention to those things too much Okay, because that that's good that alone will drive you mad. You understand you say what should I do? Well give heat to yourself Give heat unto your doctrine give attendance to reading to exhortation to doctrine Make sure that you're walking with the Lord Do you have favor with God that you're praying that you're reading the Bible that you're coming to church that you're leading your family That you're so many new winning souls to Christ. You're loving God's Word. You're loving the Lord your God with all your heart So mind and strength you're living the Christian life Okay that's what it means to give heed to yourself making sure that you're taking care of yourself and let me say this is that a Lot of Christians give heat to other people more than they gave heat unto themselves Right they pay attention to what other people are doing what's going on in the country far more than actually taking spiritual inventory of what they're doing and it's far more important for us to make sure that we're growing in grace and in knowledge and not losing our minds for what's going on out there in the world and so great advice by Jonathan by telling Them hey give heat to yourself Abide in a secret place hide yourself You need to make sure you take care of yourself and you're not putting yourself in a position Essentially where Saul can can get him so we see the plot to assassinate David and you know put yourself in David's shoes You know, this is kind of scary, you know his own leader someone who he loves and reveres Respects, you know as as a leader The king of the nation has it out for him You know the most powerful man in the land has it out for David specifically He wants to take his life and so, you know and David is a young man and So obviously we know how David might feel about that There could be a little bit of fear a little bit of anxiety there. Look at verse number four We're gonna look at we saw the plot to assassinate David now We're gonna look at the plea from Jonathan in verse number four Jonathan cites David's actions in verse four says and Jonathan spake good of David unto Saul his father and Sent to him let not the king sin against his servant against David because he had not sinned against him And because his works have been to thee word very good for he put his life in his hand and Slew the Philistine and Lord wrought a great salvation for all Israel thou sawest it and dis rejoice Wherefore then without sin against innocent blood to slay David without a cause So Jonathan simply trying to intercede and intervene here on David's behalf and just kind of knock some sense into his father He's saying why are you going after him? He's not only an innocent man. He's a just person I mean he put his life on the line for you and for this country, you know for this nation He went out and fought against Goliath You know without a sword only with the sling And so what he's trying to do here is prove the fact that David is a righteous person There should be no reason why they're trying to persecute him. Okay. Now, how do we apply this specifically to us today? Well, you know you can put this in a category of saw being like the old IFP and David being like the new IFP Okay, because of the fact that even amongst those two camps, you know, you have a lot of old IFP preachers That don't like the new IFP. They don't like the pastors of the new IFP. They don't like the church members of the new IFP I mean they borderline hate the new IFP and they're probably saved and you know They I'm sure they they love the Lord and I'm sure they love the Bible But you know It kind of gets to a point where it's just like why do you hate us so much if we are Doing what you guys do we're preaching God's Word. We're King James only we're soul winning. We're we're trying to serve God as well You know why persecute us and you know, it's almost as if you know Someone just needs to go to the old IFP and say hey, this is what the new IFP has done They've won souls to Christ or preaching God's Word. They're actually bearing the torch after you, right? They're carrying the torch Generationally spiritually speaking from what you guys were doing and they're basically going to carry on this independent fundamental Baptist movement Okay, you should be happy about that You know because the old IFP is losing a lot of young people to the liberals Okay, and and the the liberal churches and these fund centers that are out there, you know they're losing them to the to the Paul chapels and the You know that those types of churches with the purple lights and the faggoty jeans and all that They're losing them to those people whereas, you know, we're trying to keep the young people in line with being a fundamentalist Amen It's not like we're up here with purple lights and you know Torn up jeans with the barstool trying to share out of the ESV or something Because a lot of denominational churches are like that even though they're so-called Baptist and in fact There's independent fundamental Baptists. Like for example you have Liberty Baptist Church in Newport Beach Who claims to be an independent fundamental Baptist Church and it's pastored by this guy named Ryan Thompson Whose son-in-law to Jack Treiber and you know North Valley is not necessarily our template for a fundamental Baptist Church. We understand that It's not our template but in general Fundamental Baptists would consider that to be a very fundamental church. Okay, their music is sound their doctrine You know, I mean they don't preach hard but they preach out of the King James Bible they claim to be Baptist They claim to be fundamentalist. Well, you know, that's where that guy came from He took he takes over this church in Newport Beach and it's as liberal as the days long This fact you say well, what do you mean by that? You know, what's their song leader doing? What does he look like? What song leader? Well, what's that? They don't have a song leader. They have Like a like a song leaders with girls and guys up there leading the entire congregation in some liberal song or something, you know, and So, you know, it's either a hey old IFP either. Do you want that or would you prefer this? so why would you fight against us if we're essentially just like you guys with a couple of Screws that are a little more tightened right in our doctrine in our practices You Know our soul winning is the same thing as the old IFP. That's where we got it from You know, we're not trying to do just door hangers and track drops and and evangelistic services No on a week in week out basis as a church. We go out and preach the gospel to every creature that's out there We're sure we're still trying to keep this thing as soul winning. Amen We're still preaching out of the King James Bible But yet in spite of them saw the old IFP still persecutes the new IFP Still hates us still wants us to be gone In fact, they would side with the liberals more than they would side with us. Okay, which is unfortunate But you know, what are we supposed to do? Well as they would just behave ourselves wisely Just keep serving God and even though Saul is the king at the end of the day. Saul is serving the king as unto the Lord, right? He's serving the Lord by serving his king his earthly king at that point and just being a blessing and so, you know David's Reputation follows him and then let me just say this, you know I don't want to paint the old IFP with a broad brush because there are old IFP pastors out there they actually do agree with us and They like what we do and they approve of what we do. I had old IFP pastors call me and And and say hey, you know, I'm not new IFP or anything like that But I really like the fact that you guys get a lot of people saved You guys believe in Sony you guys are King James only he says I love that I had a pastor in New Mexico tell me that and and he actually is a guy that I went to college with But you know, he contacted me and said, you know, I'm not new IFP, but you know, we disagree on some stuff But I love your church. I love the fact that you guys are doing something for God. I appreciate that Okay, you know why not have that attitude instead of the attitude of all the new IFPs of the devil because they don't like the Jews or something, you know so stupid And so and look, you don't even you don't have let me just say this is that you don't have to agree with us on The Jews on the rapture to be in our church Now people maybe something somebody in our church may give you that impression, but don't listen to that person or percents Okay, if they give you this impression that you just have to be in lockstep with our church on those secondary doctrines Or you have to like like Hitler or something like that. Okay Yeah, and by the way, I don't like Hitler. Okay, let me just make that very clear Okay, but I'm not gonna I'm not gonna make people like or dislike us You know specific political leader of times past or even of today But you know if you know the person who loves Hitler in our church is just as welcome as the person who doesn't like Hitler Okay Hey, the racist is welcome in our church as well as the non racist because races need the Lord to amen the races the prejudice person needs to get safe too and You know, we need to come to terms here and have a biblical mindset but let me say let me say this is that you know just because someone Someone can come to our church and still believe that the Jews are God's chosen people and still be a member of our church It's not like you have to check off these little things here. If you don't believe these things You're just a heretic and you're not welcomed here and unfortunately, you know Some old IP pastors have that impression of us when that's not the truth Okay Now here's the thing is that if you come to our church and you believe the Jews are God's chosen people This church unlike old IP churches will preach on it. So you're welcome to be here You're just gonna have to tolerate me preaching against the Jews Okay, you just got to put up with it Okay, and you can come to the strip But by the way, you can come to this church and be a fan of Jack Trevor if you want. I Don't care. You're just gonna have to tolerate me calling them out every once in a while You can come to our church and and like some old IFP guy who just hates us But you're just gonna have to tolerate me preaching about it But other than that if you can put up with that you're welcome to be here. I don't care Okay, but don't think that oh man you have to if you have to go you have to love Hitler you have to hate the Jews Which I don't hate Jews and I don't love Hitler You know, you have to be post-trip pre-wrath Well, I'm post-trip pre-wrath, but I don't require anybody to be post-trip pre-wrath to be in our church now we'll say this is that if you're in our church, you're gonna hear preaching about the post-trip pre-wrath rapture and If you don't believe it, then you're just ignoring the facts Okay, just being prideful But what I'm saying is they obviously there's churches out there that don't agree with us on certain things But they're fine with us, but the vast majority of old IFP churches do not like new IFP churches Let's just be honest. Okay, that's why I don't really have like a preaching schedule Where I'm scheduled to preach at like IFP churches all across America because none of them would invite me to go there Other than my friends, okay And I got some of the best friends You know who are pastors who are not ashamed of having me come to their church and preach for them and vice versa But you know, there's only one church. Well, let me say this. There might be like two churches in California that would invite me to come to preach to their church for sure. One of them is Verity Baptist Church Okay, that's in Northern California and then you have whole fast Baptist Church who he hasn't invited me But I'm sure he wouldn't mind me going preach for him He's a friend of mine and I wouldn't mind him coming here to preach for me. Okay, but other than that, I'm almost I'm pretty certain that no other IFP church would ever invite me to go to their church to preach there Okay, because they think their building's gonna get bombed or something if I do So we see here that Jonathan cites David's action he's trying to talk some sense into Saul saying look he's done nothing wrong He's a good guy. Look, this is a reputation. He's a credible person He's been a person who's seeking to expand the kingdom. He's only done right to you and Saul then concedes there in verse number six and says it says saw harken unto the voice of Jonathan and Saul swear as the Lord liveth. He shall not be slain And Jonathan called David and Jonathan showed him all those things and Jonathan brought David to Saul and he was in his presence as in Times past now, this is really bad Why because he swears by the Lord? That David shall not be slain and then a couple verses after he's trying to slay David So it shows you like where his mind is Spiritually is just falling apart even to the point where he can just make a flippant remark of swearing Making an oath to the Lord to not kill somebody and then literally just turn around and change that why because he's become a covenant breaker You know making an oath before God is no longer important to him He's obviously not in his right mind and you know, we as God's people should not make vows We shouldn't make oaths and our ye should be a our nay should be nay We should make promises that we cannot keep but you know Saul is not only making a promise. He's making a very big promise He's like by the Lord as the Lord liveth. He shall not be slain and it's not like you know Oh, you know time so much time has passed by it's like immediately afterwards. He seeks to slay David So either he's just lying through his teeth, or he's just a covenant breaker. Okay, either one either way It doesn't look good for him. And so Jonathan cites David's actions Saul concedes there. Look at verse number eight We're gonna look at the persecution So we saw the plot to assassinate David the plea from Jonathan and now we're gonna see that the persecution Continues in verse number eight. We're gonna see Saul's mind continues to deteriorate verse eight says and there was war again and David went out and fought with the Philistines and slew them with the great slaughter and they fled from him and The evil spirit from the Lord was upon Saul as he sat in his house with his javelin in his hand and David played With his hand. So what do we see here? We see that in spite of everything that's taking place. David's still he's still loyal When there's war he's still going out to war. He's still succeeding. He's expanding the kingdom. He's still serving under Psalm He's doing what he's supposed to be doing the evil spirit of the Lord comes upon Saul And even aside from the fact that he's fighting the Lord's battles. What does they be doing? He's still playing before Saul. I Mean think about that. It's like this guy wants me dead But I guess I'm just gonna you know, just do what I'm supposed to do be doing here What does it show us it shows us that this man is under authority? Even to the point where maybe it would cause him some some danger Right now did anything happen to him? No Okay, now what does this teach us it teaches us that we should be under authority now obviously if your authorities casting javelins at you You know use some smarts or whatever but I believe just a principle there is the fact that David from David's perspective is that he's still under authority no matter what and Obviously, he's placing his hands in the hands of or he's placing himself in the hands of the Lord. Okay? So The evil spirit coming from the Lord was upon Saul He sits in his house with his javelin in his hand and David played with his hand so if I was David and you know, I'm scheduled to play for Saul and I come in with my little harp and I see Saul there with the javelin in his hand I mean like I Would think like why do you need that? You know, I thought I thought you you know You're not gonna throw that at me. Are you you know, it's like what you're using that for, you know First hand and Saul sought to smite David. Nah, really Saul sought to smite David even to the wall with a javelin But he slipped away out of Saul's presence and he smote the javelin to the wall and David fled fled and escaped that night This is reminiscent of Jesus Christ When the Jews sought to take Jesus and and cast him headlong and the Bible talks about how he slips away Right, and so this is very much symbolic of that as well He's able to escape and by the way, this shows us this is a principle that there is no temptation taking you But such as is common to man that God is faithful to us Then you know, he's not gonna give us more than we can handle, you know We're gonna be able to escape and and and no matter what trial or temptation you go through There's always a way to escape that right? There's always a way to escape the tribulation the trial Danger and we see that with David. I mean David's walking in playing the harp He sees the javelin in his hand and I'm sure he's probably like messing up some notes. You know what I mean? He's probably like cuz he's nervous He's like when is he gonna strike, you know? verse 11 We're gonna look at McCall's Discloses her father's plan in verse 11 says Saul also sent messengers onto David's house to watch him and to slay him in the morning And McCall David's wife told him saying if thou save not thy life tonight tomorrow thou shalt be slain Now, I don't know how McCall knows this and he kind of wonder like where's she how does she get this information, you know? But you know, she's she's Saul's Daughter, so somehow she obtained this information and in light of it warned David so he wouldn't be there So she gives him the plan says look if you stay here until the morning. They're waiting for you out there They're gonna kill you. You need to you need to get out of here in verse number 12 uh Verse number 12 says so McCall let David down through a window and he went and fled and escaped and McCall took an image and Laid it in the bed and put a pillow of goats hair for his bolster and covered it with the cloth and when Saul Sent messengers to take David She said he is sick and Saul sent the messengers again to see David saying bring him up to me in the bed that I may Slay him and when the messengers were come in behold There was an image in the bed with a pillow of goats hair for his bolster. So what do we see here? Well McCall You know what she decides to do is is it this is your your typical movie right where like if if someone you know If a prisoner is trying to escape or something like that, they'll put some sort of image You know inside of a bed so it looks like that person is sleeping and this actually works Okay, not only that it worked for David. In fact Uh Ted Bundy, for example, okay. Sorry to bring up this contrasting people here But he actually used this tactic and it actually worked. Okay, because when he when Ted Bundy was on trial for murder he was in his cell and and you know, he's he has he had a cabinet of lawyers helping him, but he was also kind of representing himself and so they would give him access to all these books and so he had all these books inside of his cell and What he did was he cut a Square inside of the ceiling of the jail that he was in and in the morning the they started the trial and He was nowhere to be found So they said, you know, they told the guards to go get him and he said oh, he's sleeping They're like he's sleeping and they're like well go wake him up We're how we're gonna like start this trial this guy is showing no respect for the judicial system here and all these things So they go over there and they're like wake up. He's not waking up They open the cell and they pull the covers back and it's just filled with books So he put all these books He stacked all these books on the bed and made it look as though he was asleep What he actually did was, you know He put that there and then he used that to to climb through the ceiling because he made himself lose weight in order to fit Through the little hole there and then he came down Where the the police lockers were he stole a change of clothes from the police and he just walked out the front door This guy was crazy. Okay, but it kind of goes to show you that it works. Okay? You know, by the way, when it says image, it doesn't mean that she put like a god like a false god there She's referring to like it looks like a person's there understand She put goats hair there for for the where his head would be on the pillow and they fell for it Okay, the messengers came and he's like, oh he's sick and they're like, oh, okay Yeah, he looks like he's still sleeping or something. And then of course Saul is determined to kill David So he's like, I don't care if he's sick bring him over here and just kill him Verse 15 and Saul sent the messengers again to see David saying bring him up to me in the bed That I may slay him and when the messengers were come in Behold there was an image in the bed with a pillow of goats hair for his bolster and Saul said unto Michal Why hast thou deceived me so and sent away my enemy that he has escaped And Michal answered Saul. He said unto me. Let me go. Why should I kill thee now? Michal obviously loves David and doesn't want him to die, right? But obviously this shows us that Michal is not necessarily a person of integrity because she lies David didn't say he was that probably Infuriated Saul even more Like oh, okay So yeah You're trying you're trying to kill my my daughter who I gave to you so she lies and says that you know essentially that David threatened her and if she wouldn't let him go then he was gonna kill her So it just makes up the story and obviously Michal is not a good lady. We see that later on But you know this kind of shows us here that you know when we do a righteous work You know, we need to make sure that our righteous works that we do Are without reproach Right. There's never you it's never good to do a right thing in a wrong way Understand, you know, it's never right to to deliver the man of God and just lie about it or something be deceptive Okay You know We need to make sure that we have that we're honest people and that our righteous works are righteous all the way You understand and for example, you know when it comes to soul winning, okay, we need to make sure that our soul winning Is honest all the way through that it's being done the right way all the way through and and making sure that we're not adding Some some dishonesty to that. You said what do you mean? Well, you know that there's people out there They will go on and preach the gospel and just make up numbers Because you know preaching the gospel is a righteous work It's a righteous work to get people saved, right? But some people do it for vainglory You understand What is vainglory because they want to be accredited as being just this awesome soul winner that gets so many people saved So what they'll do is they'll inflate the numbers a little bit be a little dishonest Count every Tom, Dick and Harry that they talk to so when they come back to church They you know, they have a belt filled with salvation is that people that probably didn't even get saved They're just doing it for vainglory reasons Understand so yeah soul winning is a righteous work. It's a righteous thing to do. It's a good thing to do It's a godly thing to do but you got to make sure you do it right with honesty Okay, and not just do that work to be seen of men You understand and let me just say this is that you know as a church that obviously so any something that we promote That we love to do You know that we that we enjoy we like getting people saved But it should never become this matter of competition or doing it for vainglorious reasons Where you just want to be viewed as just the best soul winner well you said why what's the problem with that if I want To just be a really good soul winner well I'll tell you why you're gonna end up being a dishonest holier-than-thou hyper spiritual person if that's what you're doing it for Okay, where you just want to boast about all these salvations And then you start condemning other people who are not doing it as much as you are or doing it the way you do You understand that's called pride my friends and let me say this is that you know this is common amongst churches who do a lot of soul winning I remember years ago, I went on a missions trip with Pastor Anderson to Mexico and He picked the sowing area this missions this this mission field Not necessarily for the souls although. There's people were accepted there. It was for the tacos The tacos were so good there. He's just like Two birds with one stone you know we eat good tacos, and we get people saved I mean I I have meat that you know not of kind of thing you know So we go there, and he was really excited about these tacos and by the way. He was not lying the tacos were bomb Okay, and they were very good, and so it was a I think it was Sonora. I think that's what the area was called and I remember you know we were going so winning for about I don't know I think it was from like 9 a.m.. To about 5 p.m.. Or something like that and It was it was Pastor Anderson And I were we partnered up and we went sowing for like the first half and I think you know we were going from 9 to maybe like 12 or 1 and then we would have lunch and It was really bad for us like we didn't get anybody safe the evangelist and the pastor Got no one saved Okay, we preached the gospel to a lot of people, but we got no one saved And I remember walking down the dirt road and we're like man. What's wrong with us. You know like this kind of embarrassing We're gonna walk back, and you know like no one saved and stuff like we'll see how the next half goes You know so we get back and people are like yeah, we got like 10 people our group got 15 our group and we're rejoicing right because it's great and So this person walks up and says hey, we got 10 people I think they said like 10 people or something or like wow and then she was like how many did you guys get? And we're like zero we didn't get anybody. She's like what? Wow Zero, I mean, what's the what's what's wrong? What's the problem? How come you guys only got zero like and and pastor Anderson looked at her and said oh? I don't know we're in a competition Like why are you hating that we got nobody and you guys got 10? I mean are we all on the same team I? Mean wasn't freaking pastor Anderson the one who put the whole thing together for you to even be there And you know He ended up telling me afterwards like this is the kind of crap that I have to deal with and I go on a mission Strips these holier-than-thou hyper spiritual types And he told me he goes when you start a church These are gonna come through your church, and you got to nip it at the butt and so you know he he ended up correcting The people there and basically telling them like we're not gonna tolerate hyper spiritual people Who just want to put other people down to make themselves look good, and you know oh you guys Oh, you guys are only so many for like five hours Why not seven why not eight you know souls that are burning in hell, right? It's kind of stupid hyper spiritual attitude, and it's just like oh. Oh five hours is not enough. Okay. Well it is for me Or it's just like we go sowing for eight hours. It's a white eight hours. Why not ten? Why not eleven, but this is the kind of hyper spiritual attitude that people can get and lo and behold that same lady Who said that ended up being some false prophet Infiltrator who was a Pentecostal who later on said that you can lose your salvation and a flat-earther too by the way And I had an inkling that she was a flatter because I have this I have this like this spider sense I Have like a spider sense when someone believes a stupid doctrine Like my spider sense to start going off. You know because we're on the way and and We're like in different cars in different like vans and or SUVs They were rented and we were going really early in the morning to Mexico And she said she said brother me he look at the moon doesn't look weird to you I'm like no just looks like a moon, so why do you think it had and she started asking those questions? I look at I was like are you a flatter there? She's like no I'm not I'm just wondering like why I sound like that sounds like flat earth talk there She's like no, but she ended up being one Later on she came out, and she was like the earth is flat But this you know this hyper spiritual type of an attitude And you know what look and look when we were on that mission strip there were people Who decided to go soloing longer and just don't have a problem with that? Here's the problem. Oh, man. We're back guys Yeah, we're just we just got finished finished soloing right now. We need a bunch of people to cry Oh, you guys are back already. Oh wow. Oh, why are you guys back so early? Now the guys who actually went so winning longer at that mission strip came in very quietly and very humbly And they didn't blow a trumpet They weren't like oh, you know just boasting about their work They came in quietly and humbly they went to the rooms And they didn't even talk about it why because they actually were concerned about the souls that they were winning Not about boasting about how great of a soul winner they are Okay, and so you know we need to make sure that this attitude doesn't exist in our church Okay, and let me just make myself very clear. Is that the only type of Sony that we promote in our church is door-to-door Sony Okay, not these other little cute ways of getting people saved and and you know These new ways I'm gonna make phone calls You know and just witness people through phone calls or something like that. You know if that's what you want to do That's your business don't attach our church name to that Understand and by the way if your team leader tells you we need to be back at this time You need to make sure you're back at that time Okay, don't be coming to church all late on Thursday or Sunday nights You know because when you come in you just want to have people to ask where you guys do Oh, we're just winning a bunch of people to Christ Wouldn't been you you know. It's just you say well. What's the problem with that well? You're saying that that's actually more important than coming to church And you're also having this attitude that everyone else isn't doing it, but we are because we're just so hot we're just so spiritual you understand and Anytime I catch wind of that type of attitude. I nip it at the butt really quick I will shame you and embarrass you like that. I have no problem with doing that You know why because every person who I've encountered with that attitude ended up being a wicked person And if you don't want to be labeled as a wicked person in our church, and you're like well I'm not a wicked person then stop it Stop then stop acting like one stop making me suspect that you are one if that's what you're doing Okay, be humble about it You know take care of business go sowing win people to Christ Do what you got to do, but number one don't condemn other people if they don't go as much as you do Number two don't boast about how great of a soul winner you are Okay, and by the way typically it's not just insulting sometimes people are just it pours over to other areas of the Christian life Like they read more Bible They just do more Christian things And it's just the the the hyper spirituality is just oozing out of their mouth or something like that Of how spiritual they are Okay, don't bring that nonsense around here I mean if you don't like that then go to a church where you can be a Fake fish in a bit in a small pond a big pond or whatever That's what you want to do Okay If you want to be a tadpole in a different pond you go ahead and do that I don't mind. Oh, but you're gonna miss out on so many salvations. Oh then so be it So be it Okay, we want humble soul winners here not people to go around condemning other people or you said well I don't condemn anybody, but do you condemn people by by kind of building yourself up? You understand because that's another way of doing it, right Where you just kind of make other people look bad based upon how much you're doing You understand and I know you know, we're talking about first Samuel 19 here, but I'm fitting it in somehow Okay It's we're fitting it somehow, okay, you know, David's not going around boasting of himself by the way Guess who's talking about David not David other people are talking about David Right So that's the difference between you and David David doesn't have to talk about his accomplishments and how godly he is You know the last time I checked chapter 18 the narrator of the Bible is talking about David that he behaved himself wisely It wasn't himself understand and so red flag number one is when you start bragging and boasting about how godly you are and how many souls you win and How you know you have all these cute ways of doing soul winning and you know You start condemning people by you know, showing off how much you do not right folks Let another man praise thee and not thine own lips. That's what the Bible says and So just need to make sure that you said why are you? Can we just stick to like what the story is? I'll tell you why cuz I'm the pastor here So it's my job to keep a pulse on the church So when there's this trendy little thing going on in our church or people are being hyper spiritual and they're they're acting like that I got to talk about it So, sorry if I made made you feel uncomfortable in church It's my job to make you feel that way So this is tier one of one of my warning So that means if you continue to have that behavior, I skipped tier two and I go to tier three You say what's tier three I call it the names They that sin rebuke before all the others may fear my friend But let me say this be zealous of soul winning. Amen Love souls get people saved Go out there and preach the gospel go out there and so in but be a team player and Don't act like you know more than other people who've been sowing for a lot longer than you make sure that you're being Diplomatic about it and not boasting of your works and what you can do understand. Don't be a hyper spiritual person And by the way, let me say is learn to take correction, too Hey, the young guys in our church need to learn to take correction you understand if you I Don't see here David correcting Saul Right, you see that David's not over here correcting Saul or Rebuking Saul why because Saul is an authority. He's an elder Doesn't matter how godly David is. He's not gonna correct Saul and you young man don't don't go around disrespecting and and you know calling out or Correcting or insulting the older men in our church either You're still teenager. Amen Talking to you guys right here. Amen Not just you guys but the other ones in our church as well You just you guys just got it because you're in the front. So You should have not sat next to that guy because I always get on geo and so you're catching the The aftermath of that you know you need to make sure young people in our church you make sure that you respect the older people in our church and Don't treat them like you're like your high school buddy or something like that and talk to them in a disrespectful manner either Okay, and let me just say this I deputize all the men in our church that if someone says just some some young guy says Something disrespectful to you or to someone old in our church that you openly rebuke that person in front of everyone You say well, what are their parents gonna think? Well, obviously their parents aren't doing it So parents if you don't want that to happen make sure you put your kids in check that they're not disrespecting people in our church Because if not, we'll help you out with that We will assist you Okay, and I'm not angry at the young people in our church folks we were all young at one time We're all young at one time and we've done disrespectful things and we needed someone to correct us as well You understand and so I do this out of love, you know open rebuke is better than secret love Okay, so I'm openly rebuking you because I love you and I don't want you you say well Why even bring that up? Well because you know one day you're gonna be disrespectful towards the wrong person It may not be even be someone in our church and they're gonna punch you in the mouth I'm not joking either Okay, you're gonna say some the wrong thing to the wrong person out there in the streets cuz you know You're so witty and funny. You're so quick-witted and someone's gonna knock you out and you're gonna be on someone's tik-tok You're gonna be on someone's world star You're gonna be on someone's page with a million views of how you're a mouth and off to someone and then you get knocked out Because of it. I'm trying to warn you so that you're not Thankfully Then when I grew up that stuff wasn't around so when I got beat up, you know It wasn't publicized to the world. Whoever was there saw it You got it worse because you know, these things are everywhere All right, let's get back to to let's get back to God's Word And so what were we talking about talk about What was it Michal she's she's dumb dude. She's Michal is Lying oh, that's what we're talking about. Michal is doing the right thing, but in the wrong way She could look she could have simply just said I don't want you to kill my husband So I sent him away right So she did something though. She did a good thing in the wrong way By just lying, you know what I mean? So, you know at that point it doesn't become a righteous work because you're being dishonest about it Why didn't you just say dad, you know, you're trying to kill my husband and I love my husband So I sent them away and you know what if you want to kill me for doing it and so be it But instead she she makes David look like the bad guy You know so that Saul's wrath isn't kindled against Michal still it's kindled even more against David. It's not right to do Now look at verse number 17 or verse 18 We're nearing the end here So we saw the the plot to assassinate David We see the plea from Jonathan we see the persecution of David continues And now we're going to look at the prevention now. This is a very interesting passage here Verse 18 all the way to the the conclusion of the chapter Look what it says here. We're gonna see the messengers are sidetracked. So David fled and escaped and came to Samuel to Rhema And told them all that Saul had done to him and he and Samuel went and dwelt in Naoth And it was told Saul saying behold David is at Naoth in Rhema Excuse me verse 20 and Saul sent messengers to take David and when they saw the company of the prophets prophesying and Samuel standing as appointed over them the Spirit of God was upon the messengers of Saul and they also Prophesied and it was told Psalm He sent other messengers and they prophesied likewise and Saul sent messengers again the third time and they prophesied also So this is pretty interesting Saul's like, you know, this is where David is. He sends a bunch of assassins out there to just go whack David But they get there and they start prophesying with Samuel Okay, and I'm explaining what I believe this entire little passage here is talking about just a bit But I think it's just very interesting or or should I say admirable how influential Samuel still is The fact that you know, he can sidetrack someone so easily by his godliness by his godly influence and cause these guys Who at one point were going this way to kill someone to actually do something godly and start preaching the Word of God I mean, that's great. Amen And you know, we should seek to be those that kind of Christian that we want to turn people from their wicked ways Amen, then when someone's going down a wrong path They're they're gonna commit some wicked sin or they're going down a road that we know is not good That we can be a good influence in their life and turn them to righteousness You understand you say well How do I know who I can influence with that every person that comes through those doors is a potential? Person who's going down the wrong path Now obviously they're going down the right path in the sense that they're in church But at the end of the day, you know We need to make sure that we want to influence people in a godly manner my friends Okay, be a good influence on the people in our church What do I mean by a good influence in other words your influence him for the Word of God to live? Righteously and also to just be a functioning member of society You understand, you know in our church The biggest influence that we want to be in our church is that people are just better Christians, right? Now, what does that mean what means different things for different people depending upon their biblical roles a good Christian for a husband Is that he provides for his wife that he's a godly leader for his children if they have children That he is just a man of God, you know A good Christian for a woman would be that she is submissive to her husband That she references her husband that she respects him that she that she's a keeper at home that she loves your children She's a blessing in church. She's not a gossiper You know type of a thing that's a godly influence, right? That's the kind of influence we want to be Hey for the teenagers just like I just went off a little bit ago. We want them to not be little brats. Amen Who said amen really laughs huh? That's like a personal testimony. Okay, you know, we don't want them to be little brats What do you want? We want to be to be godly young men. Okay. Let me just say is we don't have brats in our church By the way, okay. They say why are you saying that to prevent you from being a little brat? That's that's what okay you know we want to prevent you from being a little punk and Being a godly young man, and I'm thankful that we have young men in our church who are going in that direction They're godly young men and and and they're pleasing the Lord. They're under authority That's the kind of influence who want to be in their life. You understand and so Samuel, you know He not only does this once but he does it three times So three different groups go and he influences all three groups to prophesy And sidetrack them and distract them from from doing something wicked Killing David to prophesying God's Word. That's a great accomplishment. Amen and So and let me say this, you know as a pastor, that's my desire You know, I not only want to win souls to Christ. I want to turn people to righteousness as well Of course, I want to save people from hell You know, I think that's what we all want to do. But you know what the work doesn't stop there my friends You know, we need to make sure that we also turn people to righteousness We help them to clean up their lives to love the Lord to love the Bible to know doctrine We want to make sure that we are a well-balanced type of a Christian that influences others in a balanced way as well Okay, so these messengers are distracted here. Look at verse number 22 Then when he also to Rhema and Came to the great well that is in Siku and and he said and excuse me and he asked and said Where are Samuel and David and one said behold they be at Neoth and Rhema. So nothing's changed here, right? He sends these three groups They don't get the job done. He's just like man. He can't send a boy to do a man's job So he's like, I'm just gonna go myself So he goes there and he's like, where's David where's Samuel and it's just like the same place He's been at this whole time. Okay Verse 23 to 24 is really the the unusual Passage of this chapter. Okay, and I'm explaining what I believe it means look at verse 23 says that he went thither to Neoth and Rhema and the Spirit of God was upon him also and He went on and prophesied until he came to Neoth and Rhema and he stripped off his clothes also and Prophesied before Samuel and like manner and laid down naked all that day and all that night Wherefore they say is Saul also among the prophets now what in the world is going on there? It's weird, isn't it? And I've read passages like this throughout the Old Testament it you know as a new Christian for years and it just boggles my mind It's like what's going on here? Why is this happening? If you think to yourself, you know I thought the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul and now we see that the Spirit of Lord is coming upon him and he's Prophesying but then in verse 24, he's just getting naked and he's just laying on the floor. It's just like what is going on Well, let me explain to you what I believe is taking place here first and foremost The the major thing that we that I want you to notice is the fact that the reason I believe the three groups Along with Saul are being distracted. It's because God is trying to prevent them from killing David Okay, that's simply what it is he's intervening in a divine way in Order to basically sidetrack them from killing David That's the only reason the Spirit of God even came upon Saul is to kind of get him Distracted from you know going taking David's life. So he's doing this for David is what I'm saying Okay, that's the main reason why this is taking place now. Let me explain another thing here regarding this matter of prophesying. Okay? Because this may be a little different than the prophesying that we saw in chapter 18 Where the spirit the evil spirit from the Lord comes upon Saul and the Bible says that he begins to prophesy and if you remember the interpretation that I gave you was the fact that This doesn't mean he's prophesying anything good He could be prophesying lies right because the evil spirit comes upon him and we can compare that with other stories Where a lying spirit goes into the mouth of the prophets and then they prophesy lies understand I believe this is a separate issue from that. Okay, I Believe when he when the Spirit of God comes upon him, he does begin to prophesy but I don't think this is referring to Saul preaching Okay, nor do I think that the messengers were preaching? You say what do you think it's referring to? I believe what he's doing is simply singing Okay Because of the fact that although prophesying in the Bible in general is referring to Proclaiming God's Word. There are other portions of Scripture that indicate that prophesying could also mean singing Okay, go to 1st Chronicles if you would 1st Chronicles chapter 25, and I'm just gonna give you one example here Look at 1st Chronicles chapter 25 in verse number 2 1st Chronicles chapter 25 verse number 2 It says here of the sons of Asaph, Zacor and Joseph and Nethaniah and Azarilla the sons of Asaph under the hand of Asaph which prophesied according to the order of the king of Jaduthun the sons of Jaduthun Gadaliah and Zari and Jashiah Hashabiah and Mattathiah six under the hand of their father Jaduthun who prophesied listen to this with a harp Okay to give thanks and to praise the Lord So here it specifically says that their prophet go back to 1st Samuel there It says that they're prophesying with the harp. Okay Now you think to yourselves so like they're preaching With music. Well folks, isn't that what we do when we do hymns? Right hymns are literally preaching with a tune Okay, it's preaching with a tune and I'm not talking about liberal music okay, that's an evil spirit for sure, okay That's a that's a reprobate spirit, okay What this is referring to is the fact that when the Spirit of God came upon them they were Essentially moved to sing. Okay, and so I think those three groups, you know when they came They got in a sense caught up in the spirit caught up in the atmosphere of singing And what this tells me is that Sam is probably a good song leader. Amen You say that's kind of a stretch. Well folks, we have something once a month called what singspiration And you know what a group gathers around the piano and they get caught up in the spirit singing unto the Lord they get inspired people come and they sing and sometimes, you know, you lose track of time and I don't know if you notice but if you sing for a long time, you know what happens to you get tired You know, it's a little wearisome. Okay. I mean when we have those thingspirations it kills me I'll be honest because I preach Sunday morning Sunday night and then after I get done ripping on the teenagers and you know Ripping on people then we we go to the piano we sing Like I don't know 10 15 songs or something like that and we sing all the verses sometimes You know, I could get exhausting. But here's the thing when I'm in the moment. I don't even notice it Because I kind of get caught up in the moment with singing. Okay, and So what I believe is what's going on here is that? Samuel is singing He's leading this this this congregation of praise unto the Lord and then these men come and they get kind of Caught up in the moment to sing with them Okay, and then the same thing happens to Saul now obviously it's a miracle that it happens to Saul and it's an exception to the Rule that the evil spirit comes upon him because of the fact that he wants to save David alive So in order to prevent Saul from carrying out this wicked deed of murdering David He allows the Spirit of God to come upon him to be influenced in a godly way To sing these songs to the point of exhaustion where he basically, you know lays on the floor Until the all that night now the taking off of the clothes obviously at that point the Spirit of God has left them Okay, you know what? I mean? Cuz the dude's naked and it's like bro, okay but what I'm saying here is that you know music has Obviously a very godly influence Understand and you know, I want to encourage you to fall in love with singing the hymns. Amen It's a great thing to do. First of all, it reinforces doctrine Okay, it's preaching it with the tune and when you're singing in church Make a joyful noise You know if you don't know how to sing, it's alright, you know, it's cool If you can't carry a tune, don't worry about it Just just sing with your heart and and a beat get caught up in the moment of singing okay, and I truly believe that when you're singing the hymns or When you when you're involved in music in general the Spirit of God does come upon you Okay And I'm gonna give you an example, okay A couple weeks ago, you know Eric and I have been working on we were working on this on the music that we're putting out But then you know, we started talking about writing hymns, you know and I told Eric I was just like who can write hymns in our church because we gotta start writing some hymns and I was not thinking to myself at all because I think I said I can't write hymns and he said well You know if I think he said to an extent like, you know, if you can rap you can basically write a hymn I'm like, you know, tell me more, you know Explain a little deeper that you know, and he basically explained. I don't know. He you know how Eric talk sometimes. He's just like Says all these smart words and stuff And he's just like just come on. No, just tell me how it is, man So he explained it to me and I thought to myself. Oh, okay. I think I could do that Because it's better essentially it's basically doctrine with the tune You know, I mean and so that week I was inspired and I wrote like five hymns Okay, I wrote like five hymns with the courses. I even came up with the tune, but I'll be honest with you I think it was just like the Spirit of God coming upon me to Inspire me to write these songs because what I did what I essentially did was I just searched the Bible for Concepts right and and and ideas and I thought to myself this would be a great song To sing a song like this or with this concept here and then I just started thinking about doctrine And when I would write the verse I just think about doctrine and the hymn kind of just wrote itself But it showed me how closely related Music is to being filled with the Spirit. In fact Ephesians 5 teaches us that You understand and so, you know, if you ever feel like man, I feel like I'm not filled with the Spirit Then you know what start singing some hymns or pull out your hymn book and read the hymns Read them out loud Go through them sing them, you know, there's times when my wife and I were in the vehicle We'll just start bringing, you know We'll start singing hymns in the car and it'll bring a tear to our eyes and it tenderizes the heart That's why by the way That's why that's one of the reasons why we sing hymns prior to the preaching because music prepares the heart for preaching What better way to prepare the heart? than with preaching Like for example, you know when it comes to powerlifting, you know If you're gonna get into some heavy sets It's better to start with the actual workout that you're going to do and with a lighter weight, right? You can start with the bar put some more weight on there and that's a great way to warm up Well, that's the way getting filled with the Spirit is as well. The way you prepare yourself for preaching is by singing some preaching That's why you shouldn't take singing the hymns lightly Amen When Brother Paul, Brother Marcos, Brother John come up here and they tell you to open it you better open that thing up and start singing out your hearts and paying attention to the words and And and and getting filled with the Spirit because that will prepare your heart for the preaching of God's Word Understand and so I think that's what's taking place here. Okay, what's taking place here? Is that God intervened in a supernatural way to divert Saul's attention from killing David but he did it by Psalm. Okay, and so We leave off there in chapter 19 and the last principle that I want to give and I'm pretty much done is simply this You know, you just never know what God has done in your life to prevent some evils from coming upon you Right think about that Because David didn't know He's over there. He's trying to survive but he has no idea that God is putting in all this work to save him Understand You know the proverbial, you know, who knows how many times we could have died when we're out there driving or something And he he you know Caused some person to actually drive, right? You know, he caused some woman out there To actually drive correctly or something, you know and then and not hit you or something, you know, I'm joking sort of you know, he caused some person out there maybe some person meant evil unto you and He moved them in such a way that It didn't happen and the the the the example that comes to mind is when you know, we're going through our deal You know I was in Arizona preaching and there's someone just like there was for David outside of my house waiting for me to come home Now I'm over in Arizona With my family. I don't even know what's going on back home But you know God obviously moved that person to just give up and go home and just forget about me and and save my life You understand and so think about that the fact that you know God has a providential hand over you and your family and our church and we got to continue to pray that God would do so All right, consumer Lord protect us protect me protect my family even when you know, I think everything is going well You know I know you're working behind the scenes protecting me from dangers from temptations leaving not into temptation deliver me from evil You know, we see that God did that with David and he could do it for us as well. Amen That's pretty much it. Let's pray father. We thank you so much for your word. Thank you so much for the story and What an inspiration David is and to see that he's just doing the best that he can To be pleasing unto you and to even serve his his authority and because of that You extended your your hand of protection towards him even in times that he didn't know and Lord may you do the same for us We're not perfect and we make mistakes But Lord we love you and and I pray that you would protect our the families in our church protect The individuals the singles the teens Lord the children The families that your hand may be upon us and that we would that we would look for that hand And be reminded that it may remind us to give thanks unto you For your deliverance Lord, and I pray father God that you bless us. We love you so much And we thank you pray these things in Jesus name. Amen