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you oh Right good afternoon everyone welcome back strong old baptist church. You know what your handles some of the 160 So 161 So 161 Right church, let's sing this out on the first me oh ah oh oh oh oh Heavenly father, please bless the service this evening and they can work for everyone who's here this evening And if you could bless the preaching and open our ears to hear it this evening more and bless the entire service including music And we ask this in Jesus name. Amen All right, let's turn to our next song song 208 So 208 Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh See Amen all right, it's great to see you all back here this evening This time we'll go through our announcements if you do not have a bulletin slip your hand up real high We'll make sure that we get one out to you And if you open up to the first page, you'll see our service times Sunday morning at 1030 Sunday afternoon again at 4 p.m. And Wednesday at 7 is our Bible study Soul-winning opportunities are listed there as well as the salvations and baptisms It's going to count up any salvations prior to today anything any salvation to report prior to today One yesterday. Amen. All right Anything Else prior to today and then how about for today and he say yes, sir to here To three Wow two three and two Amen, all right, very good was the Obviously, I wasn't able to join the group today Was there a lot of Spanish speaking doors or was it was still a lot Spanish speaking doors kind of mix Obviously it was a mix because there's a good amount of salvation for You know Size group that went out. That's cool Praise God, it's a good day Also, did I miss anyone any salvation? I miss anyone. All right We're gonna be as The Sunday the Sunday afternoon soul winning is undergoing some changes I mentioned that this morning and we're starting to come up with some things are gonna be hopefully just more efficient more helpful I just want to cover a few things. I'm gonna start doing differently One of them is I really want people to get paired up and teamed up and get maps Before you leave church after the morning service so we're you know, and again bear with us if maps aren't already or whatever like like We're getting into a routine. We're trying to get everything all Working nice and smoothly, but we're gonna have maps available. I'm gonna have we're gonna have a place For maps in general that we're gonna keep all of the maps that need to be done I'm gonna have a place for completed maps that are they're all gonna stay here on site and then we're gonna have a place for maps that are partially complete and One of the things I'd like you to do is to mark your name If you haven't if you if you worked on a spot You got a map and you didn't fully complete it put your name at the top of that map One if there's any questions about what's done or what's not done We can go back and talk to the person who used it and two It's gonna be easier to find if we keep everything that's partial here You know Maybe next week you want to go back and finish the area that you worked on before starting a new one It's easier to find the one that you worked on if your name's on it, right? I mean it just this kind of makes sense. So You know, the goal is obviously to hit all the houses. I don't want to be left with a whole bunch of partials That are just not done and like keep moving to new places So there's gonna be time for we're gonna need to clear through those obviously if there's you know A different area that we're gonna be targeting but there's like one or two houses You may not want to drive all the way over there for a couple of houses and then drive again somewhere else but at some point we're gonna need to be able to Kind of clean everything up and make sure that we get everything as a goal It's a knock every door. So Those are some of the things I want to do. So In the book in the morning, I asked brother Vernon if he's you know in general He's the one leading that this opening time on on Sundays So he'll call everyone to you know when he's here and then when he's not here brother Jesse will be you know, they'll be teaming together brother This is making a map for the Vern's kind of lean in leading the group and and making sure everyone has partners So what we'll do is he'll just call everyone real quick after service and he's like, hey You know come over here to get your assignments and and make sure that everybody is partnered up Okay That way you could leave here everyone could go do whatever you want for lunch and then get started on your area Whenever it's gonna work out best for you And then you know people who are ready early could go out and get get going and we're not just waiting on everybody to start up, so I think that's gonna be Right now the best way that we're gonna do this just make sure when you when you have the maps that you could bring them back It's gonna be great if you can collect, you know pass them back to And I don't know if we've decided we go back to you brother Jesse Because we're gonna need to kind of keep things up to date you're gonna need to see them anyways Yeah, yeah, we'll do we'll do a bin like that something to that effect where we've got the three categories of new complete and Partial So that everyone could just be putting them back there Yeah, you don't have to you don't have to seek out a person I think it's best just to just to put it into place and I'll get an organizer hopefully by next week just to have in the church building and Then you can monitor those bins and make sure that you're up to date on on whatever you need to To update on on a digital map or something like that. So Yeah, I appreciate everyone, you know working on and if you have any any ideas Let us know the other thing we're gonna oh the other thing I was gonna have you do brother Vern I'm gonna have you take maybe an extra map with you on just regularly on Sundays because occasionally we have people like I know what happened today where sometimes people aren't able to make it for the morning service But they want to go soul winning and whatever so that happens from time to time So this way they could just you could just be prepared. You could have the map for them Maybe even just take a photo of it and send them a message or whatever, right? that's a good way then we could have an extra one on hand and And be able to work that way so we could still use the chat for finding partners again if you know, hopefully everyone could get partnered up here and paired up here, but We'll still use that that chat group to kind of keep things up to date and communicate when needed But but that's what's going on So, you know if you have any ideas you think that things can operate a little bit more smoothly You know if we do this or that please, you know by all means let me know We're trying to just make things as much as just efficient as possible Make maximize the use of our time and make sure everything's being done decently in order and we could just just get as many doors knocked as possible in the in a time frame we have so That's the plan and that's where we're at right now and I think it's gonna be a good system We've already done things very similar to this in the past We're honing it in so We're just as we grow especially this is gonna be more important to do this Efficiently and as we grow the more people are involved in the chat it gets I think more confusing than anything else so this is one of the reasons why I want to make sure that we're doing things this way, but Alright that all that being said Let's continue on with the announcements. We've got the offering totals down at the bottom of the page for the month of November Pray requests continue to pray for everybody on a list. We have a lot of a lot of people in the church Thank God a lot of women who are pregnant and be praying that those pregnancies will go well pray for brother Devin's grandmother Doris She's she's they're they're deciding on surgery for that. They've already decided that it's probably the best course of action. So They're gonna be he'll give us some more updates on when that's gonna happen what the details are But obviously her her eye socket is is not doing well recovering on its own So pray that God will help her to heal Brother mo do we have any updates? Did you get the results yet? And I know we're waiting on some test results Are you sure we're still waiting on? Okay Right, right, right So is this a little unexpected because when we talked before it sounded like they thought that was gonna be pretty easy to control and Right Okay Okay, so that they don't have a plan yet of how they want to Okay Okay You Treatment yeah Absolutely, yeah, yeah, we're continuing to pray for for brother mo Obviously what what I said this morning was old information We were commenting on from the last time we communicated that that things didn't seem too bad But now it's the results aren't quite as good from the latest test. They think you might be at stage three instead of stage two and We'll continue to pray for brother mo and they're gonna he's gonna go and talk to doctors this week So that they could give him a plan of treatment and and hopefully hopefully they'll still get everything under control without too much medication or things like that maybe with diet some other things and and see if we can Hopefully hopefully I'll do so pray pray for brother mo pray for the wisdom of his doctors and And just pray that God will will heal them and help them to continue to keep serving them. So appreciate that update and I think that's it for the update. So we'll you know, obviously bring these home with you pray for the people on the list definitely very important to pray on The next page now I counted this morning that there were five people that completed the challenge for November Is there anybody that completed the November challenge that I did not I got you because I knew that you had done it I know you weren't sitting in here and raise your hand, but I got you Is there anyone else that didn't raise their hand? That completed it November, okay I'm going with five prizes December is the singing challenge. So this this month the the goal is to not listen any worldly music any day of the month. So First through the 31st and then also to sing four hymns bring the song book home with you Sing your favorite hymns, whatever out of song book But sing four of them every day praise the Lord with your voice is kind of the the goal of that and Yes, if you're in church and you sing songs here that counts because this is for a day You know, you don't have to sing any more extra like today We say if you're in for two services you sing eight songs. You don't have to do four more I mean, I think it's a good good practice to do more if you want to but for the challenge purposes We're you know, you get you get the four songs in a day That is sufficient for the challenge. We're doing Christmas caroling on December 18th So what we'll count this even if you're only doing two songs This Will count for the amount of time that you're singing those two songs You don't have to mix in two other songs on that day if you go Christmas caroling because you'll be caroling for an hour, so Well, we'll count that as satisfactory for our singing challenge on Saturday that Saturday But if you can make it out for that great December 18th, it's a Saturday. Try to be our four o'clock There's gonna be pizza afterwards and I know these guys have a lot of fun I wish I could make it but again this year. I'm not gonna be able to make it for that event But hopefully you could get out here for that watch night service is going to be here December 31st 7 p.m Nothing has changed. I made the update this morning. I'll announce it again We had been Looking for a new building a new place to meet there's some confusion some things that happen or I thought that we were well We were gonna have to be out of here by the first and that's changed. It's updated Now we were able to sign a lease for another year here. So we are here until the end of next year Which this space will serve us great until then. I'm confident, but we'll be looking for a new space next year So that that is settled. We're not we're not moving anywhere Anytime really soon and when we do move just so you know, I've said this before we're planning on staying Relatively close to where we are right now. So there's never any guarantee on how far we're gonna be able to be from this place Because by next year, we're probably gonna have to move anyways, just hopefully for growth reasons. We're kind of growing out of this place that's that's the plan and You know, we're the the goal is to stay close But the problem is that there's it's hard to find spaces to rent. So we're really gonna be constrained by What we could find so just just keep that in mind and we have people coming from all over the place So my goal is to say well this has been working out. I like the area here I really want to stay as close as we can and Make it as most convenient for everybody that comes to church as possible from all different directions but if Anything my goal is also to stay really close to a freeway so Anything we're just easier access if we if we move five minutes up the road on a freeway Who cares right? I mean, it's that's not a big deal almost from anywhere where you're coming from. It should be fine So that that's what I'm looking at. But just you know, you can also pray for that obviously right now we're pretty set for a while, but You know pray that God will lead us and into a place It's gonna just work out really well for us work out and and help us to be able to just be Really functional as a church to to get things done I mean, it's a whole point of having a building to meet in is that we could just facilitate everything and do so Quickly and efficiently. All right, I'm starting to ramble. Let's keep going here You got the upcoming events there next year for the home school field trip as well as our camping trip And then the upcoming birthdays and anniversaries we sang to miss Courtney this morning. We're gonna sing to Katie This evening. It's her birthday. Appreciate you both being here on your birthdays Happy birthday, and we're gonna sing happy birthday to Katie Happy birthday to you Happy birthday to you Happy birthday, dear Katie Happy birthday to you Very good, so two birthdays today We've looked like we have another birthday until just after next week and you can see the rest of the anniversary Birthdays there on the page on the back is the Romans chapter 4 Bible memory passage So if you already completed the November challenge, you know what? Go ahead and just start doing some other Bible memory on your own until we get through this for the next couple weeks. I Don't have any you know, I'm trying to keep a pace here with just the church in general So I know a lot of you that they were able to complete the challenge do other Bible memory. Anyways, so I'll leave you to that but we will have a new Passage and also just so you know, we also if you know if you haven't been coming while you haven't noticed We kind of go back and forth between some smaller easier passages and some a little bit longer and more difficult passages So next one we're going to do is going to be a little bit smaller I really I try to get as many people involved as possible on doing those so for those of you that that want to challenge yourself even more and you'd like to keep a More of a pace you keep that in mind too. The next one we do is gonna be probably pretty small So don't let that interfere with with your own plans if you're already doing Bible memory, that's great. So That's about it for our announcements so I'm going to ask brother Peter come up he's gonna lead us in our next song Oh So I'm 433 away in a manger As we learned this morning Jesus was crying song 433 My church on the first I Oh Afternoon offering Church while the offering plate is being passed around if you know your Bibles the book of 1st Samuel chapter 10 That's 1st Samuel chapter 10 And as we do customary here at stronghold Baptist Church, we're going to read the entire chapter That's brother Devin if he can please do that Once again, that was 1st Samuel chapter 10 then Samuel took a vial of oil and poured it upon his head and kissed him and said It is not because the Lord hath anointed thee to be Captain over his inheritance when thou art departed for me today Then thou shalt find two men by Rachel sepulcher in the border of Benjamin at Zelzah And they will say unto thee the acids which thou wentest to seek or found And lo thy father hath left the care of the asses and sorrow with for you saying what shall I do for my son? Then shalt thou go on forward from thence and thou shalt come to the plain of Tabor and there shall meet the three men going up to God to Bethel one carrying three kids and another carrying three loaves of bread and Another carrying a bottle of wine and they will salute thee and give thee two loaves of bread Which thou shalt receive of their hands after that thou shalt come to the hill of God Where is the garrison of the Philistines and it shall come to pass? When thou art come thither to the city that thou shalt meet a company of prophets coming down from the high place with a psaltery and a tabaret and a pipe and a harp before them and they shall prophesy and the Spirit of the Lord will come upon thee and thou shalt prophesy with them and shalt be turned into another man and let it be when these signs are coming to thee that thou do as Occasions serve thee for God is with thee and thou shalt go down before me to Gilgal and behold I will come down unto thee to offer burnt offerings and to sacrifice sacrifices of peace offerings Seven days shalt thou tarry till I come to thee and show thee what thou shalt do and it was so that when He had turned his back to go from Samuel God gave him another heart and all those signs came to pass that day and When they came thither to the hill behold a company of prophets met him and the Spirit of God came upon him and he prophesied Among them and it came to pass when all that knew him before time saw that behold He prophesied among the prophets then the people said one to another what is this that has come unto unto the son of Kish? It saw also among the prophets and one of the same place answered and said but who is their father? Therefore it became a proverb it saw also among the prophets and when he had made an end of prophesying He came to the high place and Saul's uncle said unto him and to his servant whither went ye And he said to seek the asses and when we saw that they were nowhere We came to Samuel and Saul's uncle said tell me I pray thee what Samuel said unto you and Saul said unto his uncle He told us plainly that the asses were found but of the matter of the kingdom where of Saul spake He told him not and Samuel called to the people together unto the Lord to misba and said unto the children of Israel thus saith the Lord God of Israel I brought up Israel out of Egypt and delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of All kingdoms and of them that oppressed you and you have this day rejected your God who himself saved you out of all your adverse Adversities and of your tribulations and you have said unto him nay, but said a king over us now therefore present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes and by your Thousands and when Samuel had caused all the tribes of Israel to come near the tribe of Benjamin was taken when he had caused the tribe of Benjamin to come near by their families the family of Matri was taken and Saul the son of Kish was taken and when they sought for and when they saw him he could not be found Therefore they inquired of the Lord further if the man should yet come thither and the Lord answered behold He hath hid himself among the stuff and they ran and fetched him fence and when he stood among the people he was higher than any of the people from his shoulders and upward and Samuel said to all the people see him whom the Lord hath chosen that there is none like him Among all the people and all the people shouted and said God save the king Then Samuel told the people the manner of the kingdom and wrote it in a book and laid it up before the Lord and Samuel Sent all the people away every man to his house and saw also went home to Gibeah and there went with him Abandoned men whose hearts God had touched but the children of Belial said how shall this man save us? And they despised him and brought him no presence, but he held his peace Let's pray Dear Lord. Thank you for this opportunity to be here in your house tonight. I pray that you would just bless our service for us Bless our years help us to hear and learn something now and prayer that you would please just help minimize distractions And bless pastors he comes and in Jesus name I pray. Amen All right, so this evening sermon I want we're going to be doing kind of a Bible study into King Saul and The time my sermon is an evil spirit from the Lord and we're gonna see how God sent an evil spirit upon King Saul we're gonna look kind of what brought that on and some of the attributes of King Saul and one of the reasons why I think is really interesting is because I believe that King Saul was a saved person I'm going to show you why I believe that he was saved So he's someone that he's not some unbeliever because when you think about an evil spirit I mean you think about this if someone's you know an evil spirit from the Lord Well, wow, that must be some really bad guy who's unsaved and God's just but you know But when you start to consider that well, wait a minute if this guy is saved and he's still receiving of an evil spirit from God You know, well, what's to stop God from spending an evil spirit on any one of us who are saved right and answer is nothing So what I want to do is kind of look at one What does it mean to have an evil spirit from the Lord because it does not mean he's possessed with the devil Okay, the two different things the spirit coming and troubling him and and bothering him and and vexing him is not the same as being Possessed literally of a devil doing things because the devil is possessing you. That's not the same thing but First before we get like too far here I wanted to start and show you just some reasons why I believe Saul was saved There's there's one major reason but we started off here in first Samuel chapter 10 Which gives us a lot of the positive things about King Saul. So when King Saul first started he was a pretty good guy He was a humble guy, you know, he didn't think very highly of himself in general and We see that he fought some battles and won and trusted in the Lord Very early on very early on was doing good, but not very long after that He started straying from the Lord Let's look at verse number five here where we just read in first Samuel chapter 10 I said after that after that thou shalt come to the hill of God Where is the garrison of the Philistines and it shall come to pass when thou art come thither to the city? That thou shalt meet a company of the prophets coming down from the high place with a psaltery and a tabaret and a pipe and a Harp before them and they shall prophesy this is this is Samuel speaking to Saul Okay, he's telling him you're gonna see this and this is verse 6 and the Spirit of the Lord will come upon thee and thou Shall prophesy with them and shalt be turned into another man Now I'm not saying that this is like the moment of his salvation. But what I'm saying is that here he's being used by God with the Spirit of Lord coming upon him even to the point of just being turned into like another man the way that he's gonna be used and prophesying through the the Spirit of God and Preaching like these other prophets were preaching even though he wasn't a preacher the Holy Spirit's gonna come upon him and he's gonna be used in this fashion now as My first piece of evidence. This is still small as far as him being saved We have seen God use unsaved people to deliver his word before at least words that are found in the Word of God But we don't really see the language being used where the Holy Spirit is coming upon some unsaved person to like preach sermons and prophesy The way that is being done here with King Saul. I think this is a little bit different We could use a little bit of sense to see that but let's keep reading here. It says number seven let it be when these signs are come unto thee that thou do as occasion serve thee for God is with thee and Thou shalt go down before me to Gilgal and behold I will come down unto thee to offer burnt offerings and to sacrifice sacrifices of peace offering seven days shalt thou Terry Till I come to thee and show thee what thou shalt do and it was so that when he had turned his back to go from Samuel God gave him another heart and All those signs came to pass that day and when they came dither to the hill behold a company of prophets met him and the Spirit of God came upon him and he prophesied among them and it came to pass When all that knew him before time saw that behold he prophesied among the prophets then the people said one to another what is this? That is come unto the son of Kish is Saul also among the prophets so Stark contrast of the personality and who saw was anyone who knew him, you know We're gonna see here a little bit later on that. Well, let's just jump down to right now Look at verse number 21 the Bible says and this is when they're actually anointing him to be king You know Samuel already know him, but this is what he's doing this public thing It says when he had caused the tribe of Benjamin to come near by their families a family of matri was taken and saw the Son of Kish was taken and when they sought him he could not be found Therefore they inquired of the Lord further if the man should yet come thither and the Lord answered behold He had to hid himself among the stuff. So Saul is the type of person where he's like, you know they're going to finally just make him officially publicly this king over Israel and he's nervous or you know, just Doesn't what kind of shy right? He doesn't want to be in front of everybody and God's like he's hit himself. He's there. He's just hit himself among the stuff They're going like God is this really the guy that you want leading us? And you're like, yeah, just you know, just bring him out. That's the personality. That's the shyness that we see in King Saul So then when he starts prophesying he's preaching with these other prophets. It's like wow He's like I mean he said like another person God has given him another heart and this speaks a little bit to what you know What I was taught before about God giving you what you need when you need it So if God has a job for you to do obviously God was was endorsing Saul to be the king of Israel even though he'd already explained and And made sure the children of Israel knew that it was wicked and wrong for them to even want a king But since they had selected a king He's the God still had these you know rules and places laws in place on how they still ought to choose a king And you know, they could still serve God and can still have a godly king Even though that wasn't what he had intended for them or wanted for them He was still able to give them a king that can be righteous that could be good That could be filled with the Spirit of God and that could lead them in a good direction And this is what we see happening here with King Saul at the very beginning. We see that he's humble I believe from these two things. It's already indicative that he was saved But kind of the the clinch pin for demonstrating this and we show this to people out sorting But flip over to chapter 28 of 1st Samuel. It's been almost entire night in 1st Samuel. I Just want to get this established first 1st Samuel 28 And We're gonna read more of this story later on but I'm gonna jump to the verse where you know He goes to the witch the witch calls up Samuel cuz Samuel had died at this point and And he's trying to inquire of the Lord and then Samuel says this unto King Saul in verse number 19 Moreover the Lord will also deliver Israel with thee into the hand of the Philistines so basically saying you're gonna lose in your battle to the Philistines tomorrow and Tomorrow shalt thou and thy sons be with me The Lord also shall deliver the host of Israel into the hand of the Philistines So the fact that Samuel and we know Samuel speaking again We'll get into this a little bit more later in the sermon when we get to chapter 28 through through the course of kind of Going through a lot of this stuff Samuel was saved. I don't have any doubt about that the prophet of the Lord Samuel We could see many I'm not going to go through and prove all of that from Scripture The fact that we're reading first and second Samuel is Is probably pretty good indicator that at least the guy was saved But him saying he's gonna be with with him like you and your sons are gonna be with me He wasn't burning in hell So he's not burning in hell then Obviously Saul and his sons aren't gonna go and be burning in hell because they're gonna be with him, right? So I mean to me it just kind of makes a lot of sense now The reason why we do this out soul winning is because every once in a while you get someone Who gets hung up on the notion of like suicide, right? And they think that well, you know any other sin you commit is fine But if you commit suicide man, you're definitely going to hell, right? We're trying to show him eternal security and we show him. Well, hey Saul is a guy That did commit suicide Because he ended up falling on his own sword. If you want you could just flip over to chapter 31 We'll see that in the scripture Saul takes his own life Yet as we saw there in In chapter 28 Samuel still saying you're gonna be with me So what happens is he's wounded by an arrow and he's pretty much mortally wounded and he doesn't want The Philistines to do anything to him while he's still alive and he wants to die. So It says here in verse number three and the battle went sore against Saul and the archers hit him This is the next day, of course And he was sore wounded of the archers Then said Saul and his armor-bearer draw thy sword and thrust me through there with lest he's uncircumcised come and thrust me through and abuse Me so he asked his armor-bearer like hey, man Just you know kill me now because I don't want them to do anything bad to me Says here, but his armor-bearer would not for he was sore afraid. Therefore Saul took a sword and fell upon it So his armor is like no, I'm not gonna kill you Like I'm not I'm not gonna give you that that last blow not gonna do it So Saul's like fine whatever and then he just he does it himself He falls on his own sword verse 5 says and when his armor-bearer saw that Saul was dead He fell likewise upon his sword and died with him now We also have an account of this in first Chronicles chapter 10, which is a parallel passage to this. I'll read it for you first Chronicles chapter 10 verse 4 says then said Saul to his armor-bearer draw thy sword and thrust me through there with lest he's uncircumcised come and abuse me But his armor-bearer would not for he was sore afraid so Saul took a sword and fell upon it and when his armor-bearer saw That Saul was dead. He fell likewise on the sword and died. So Saul died and his three sons and all his house died together Both of those accounts both of those testimonies are in Scripture Saying that Saul fell on his own sword and he died and his armor-bearer saw him die Why am I why do you care about this? Why are you making a big point about this passive version? well in second Samuel chapter 1 there's another account given that's a little bit different and This account though see in first Samuel chapter 31 as well as first Chronicles chapter 10 The story is being told by a narrator The narrator of the Bible is the Holy Ghost We always need to make sure we're paying attention to Who is saying what when we read the Bible because the devil is quoted in Scripture, but what the devil says? Isn't true, right? We know that devil is a liar and the father of it Or you could read the book of Job and read some of the things from Job's friends But you can't trust that what they're saying is true Even though it's recorded as to what they said because at the end of job God says you know that they need to offer up sacrifices and that job needs to pray for them Because they did not speak the things that were right concerning God like his servant job did So God already says pronounces at the end of job that what his friends were saying about God were wrong So but we have what they said recorded in Scripture, right? So you always got to be paying attention who's saying what are just because they say something doesn't mean they're right Just like Mary said to Joseph, you know to Jesus to me when he was younger My father and I have sought thee right? Well Joseph wasn't his father God was and that's why I said, you know that I must be about my father's business kind of rebuking her subtly You know as a younger child Saying that he's doing the work of his father as true father, right? so there's a lot of things that you got to be paying attention to in Scripture, but what we have in 2nd Samuel chapter 1 is This guy that shows up to King to David remember David and Saul were at odds with each other David was already anointed King by Samuel David was rightfully supposed to be King God's the one then who is behind David after Saul fell from fell from grace and ascent You know didn't lose his salvation, but wasn't supposed to be king anymore He was that that that honor was taken away from him and given to David So there are you know enemies against each other so this guy shows up from the battle Let's start reading your verse number three and David said unto him from whence comest thou This is 2nd Samuel chapter 1 verse number 3 and David said from unto him from whence comest thou and he said on him out of The camp of Israel am I escaped and David said unto him how went the matter? I prayed he tell me and he answered That the people are fled from the battle and many of the people also are fallen and dead and Saul and Jonathan his son are Dead also And David said unto the young man that told him how knowest thou that Saul and Jonathan his son be dead so he wants to know Well, how do you know he's dead and? The young man that told him said as I happened by chance upon Mount Gilboa behold Saul leaned upon his spear and lo the chariots and horsemen followed hard after him and When he looked behind him he saw me and called unto me and I answered Here am I and he said unto me who art thou and I said and I answered him. I am an Amalekite He said unto me again stand I pray thee upon me and slay me for anguish has come upon me because my life is yet Whole in me so I stood upon him and slew him because I was sure that he could not live After that he was fallen and I took the crown that was upon his head and the bracelet that was on his arm and have Brought them hither unto my Lord So this guy is claiming that Saul wasn't dead That he happened to come upon him and Saul's like hey, I'm still alive You know basically finished me off and he's saying yep, so I stood on him and I made sure then that he died I could see he wasn't gonna live through it anyways so he gives this version of the story which is not told in either of the other accounts at all and In fact the other account that he's telling is that Saul was dead Accounts at all and in fact the other accounts say that the armor-bearer saw him die They fell on his own sword not his own spirit fell on his own sword, and what does this guy do? this guy's saying this because he came to the what really happened he came to this body of Saul and took and Strip things off of his dead body He took the crown because he's he then he's thinking in his head like I'm gonna bring this to David and gain the favor Of David because he's gonna be happy now that I'm gonna tell him I'm gonna bring him the news I'm gonna bring him this crown and he's thinking he's gonna be rewarded for being the messenger And he also added in that little bit of yeah And I and I had a little part to play in the death of Saul he wasn't expecting the response that David gives him Because David actually gets really angry, and he's like you know basically you you you judge yourself How dare you lift up your hand against the Lord's anointed you know he's having he really is just just lays into him But that's not what this guy thought He has a motive. He's the one speaking. He's the one telling the story. He's not the one that killed Saul The accounts from the narrator said that so Saul died like that's how it happened So Saul died and his three sons He fell on his own sword when his armor-bearer wouldn't do it for him and when the armor-bearer saw that he died Then he took his own life That's what happened, and that's the the witness to witnesses in 1st Chronicles 10 as well as in 1st Samuel chapter 31 why I even make a big deal of that because Suicide is not some mortal sin that's gonna send a person to hell if someone is saved They are saved they have eternal life even suicide does not damn that soul to hell and Saul is the example of that Saul someone who and this is why we go out so when we show people that To demonstrate that I want to make it clear that you're not confused of going well Wait, maybe he didn't take his own life because we've got this guy saying that he you know he finished him off or whatever There's no confusion This guy just wanted a little something extra for himself He'd embellished the story To make himself look better to try to gain favor with David since he was going to be now legit like the next king That's why that happened and this was not really in my notes But I wanted to cover that before we continue going in further turn if you would now back to the first Samuel chapter 13 Because the story of King Saul is not a good story Now was he saved yes He started off fine, but like I said he just barely Started off fine like he he started off fine for a short period of time Because even that first commandment that we see there in first Samuel chapter 10 we see Samuel instructing Saul what to do and he says wait there seven days And he says wait there seven days, and I'll be he's giving him these instructions that he's gonna fail at Anyways, it's like one of the very first things that he screws up and does wrong is One of the very first instructions that that he's given in chapter 10 And as you can see like between chapter 10 chapter 13 chapter 13 starts off Saul reigned one year and when he had reigned two years over Israel Saul chose him So this is starting off basically just in the second year of his reign He's only rained for a year. He hasn't had very much time to establish himself and everything else But what I want to do is I want to look at the things that Saul did wrong Because Being plagued with an evil spirit from God. I also want to show you That Sometimes the things that you can do that are that are wrong or wicked that could that could cause you Potentially be plagued by an evil spirit from the Lord May not be as severe or drastic in your own mind that you think it is Now they are big deals and with King Saul he sinned is a big deal in what he did But as we're gonna see and we continue through this he never thought what he did was a big deal And That is a big deal in itself And hopefully if you take something from the sermon is to be able to do self analysis on Your sins on what you do and not always try to justify yourself Before God because this can lead you into having a lot more problems Saul had a lot of problems from the Lord that he didn't have to have that he brought on himself And If you think about it as we go through this to do a comparison Between King Saul and King David in your mind if whatever you know about King David We know and I mentioned this this morning. You know King David commit adultery and murder Those are some pretty significant sins, that's not some little deal. That's it. That's a big deal. I mean those are two Both of them are capital crimes Both of them and he commit both he committed adultery and he commit murder And he was responsible, but what happened with David? He found mercy and grace in the eyes of the Lord When David was confronted about his sin He repented he grieved he truly was was you know sorrowful he truly repented he truly you know wanted to get right with God at a heart to then to restore a Relationship with God and accept his responsibility and and not try to sugarcoat what he had done But just fessed up and said Yes, I did it And that alone is huge okay that Spirit that repentance God wants to see that in all of us When you do wrong even if it's a really big deal Don't dig your heels in and harden your neck Because that's when things are going to get really bad for you Before I continue further on that let's just go back now and take a look at some of the things that Saul did Because what I would say you know for most of us at least today. You're gonna look at what Saul did and be like That's not nearly as bad as what David did Yet Saul was the one plagued with the evil spirit from the Lord Look at verse number five the Bible says and the Philistines gathered themselves together to fight with Israel 30,000 chariots and 6,000 horsemen and People as the sand which is on the seashore in multitude And they came up and pitched in Micmash eastward from Beth-avon When the men of Israel saw that they were in a strait For the people were distressed Then the people did hide themselves in caves and in thickets and in rocks and in high places and in pits so Also remember having a king is new for Israel Right they're not new as a people or as a nation, but having a king is new for them The people of Israel are the people who are the people who are the people who are the people who are the people who are the people The people are confronted with a massive army Way outnumbering them and the people freak out and they get scared Right so it's I mean they start hiding anywhere. They can they're like we're gonna. We're gonna hide out You know there's a cave over here. Go hide up there Hopefully they won't see it. You know see me, and then I could get through this or whatever and Saul is like in charge of this group of people who are super scared Verse 7 says in some of the Hebrews went over Jordan to land of Gad and Gilead as for Saul He was yet in Gilgal and all the people followed him trembling, so he's still got some people following him But they're scared They're trembling right and he's supposed to be this leader verse 8 says and he tarried seven days According to the set time that Samuel had appointed so he waits seven days That's what he was supposed to do that's who's instructed to do to wait for Samuel But Samuel came not to Gilgal and the people were scattered from him so obviously over the course of this week People are getting more and more scared. They're going man. I don't want to face this I want to do then and they're starting to to leave left and right So this is a situation that Saul's in verse 9 says and Saul said bring hither a burnt offering to me in peace offerings And he offered the burnt offering This is what Samuel was going to do this is what he was waiting for Samuel to do so he says well He's gonna be here. He's not here. So I'm just gonna take matters into my own hands and do this now The big problem with this is that Saul was a Benjamite He was not a Levite. It was not his job It was not it was definitely not his job from God to be offering any burnt offerings or any Sacrifices you know Testament people can you couldn't just have anybody doing that work. God had isolated the the and sanctified the Levites To be the people who were gonna do that service for him They were people who were holy and separated to do that work. No one else was allowed to do that But King Saul decided well, you know Desperate times call for desperate measures basically, so Who cares ultimately what's right? We still need to offer the sacrifice to the Lord so I might as well just do it Samuel's not here Verse 10 and it came to pass that as soon as he had made an end of offering the burnt offering behold Samuel came I Mean he just barely had enough time to even do the offering and then there's Samuel So I mean how late was he really he waited the seven days? He was still coming that day Because he had just made this the sacrifice. He's a little bit late from the time appointed But he still makes it there With plenty of time to have done the offering himself anyway, you know for Samuel to have undone the offering he shows up It says and Saul went out to meet him that he might salute him so it's all a great All right, Samuel's here cool, but he doesn't think there's anything wrong. He didn't even see a problem with what he had done Verse 11 and sandwich said what has thou done? Samuel sees it right away. He's a big. What do you what have you done? And Saul said because I saw that the people were scattered from me and That thou camest not within the days appointed and that the Philistines gathered themselves together at McMash Therefore said I the Philistines will come down now upon me to Gilgal and I have not made supplication unto the Lord. I Forced myself therefore and offered a burnt obviously I had to force myself to do this, right? I didn't really want to do this. I didn't really want to sin I wanted to do everything right, but I just forced myself to do this You know in order to offer a burnt offering now think about this too because you know I as wicked as Saul was and he was wicked we need to see the wickedness for what it is and Not get caught up in the same trap that Saul got caught in What's he trying to do here? He's trying to offer something unto the Lord, right? It's not like he's trying to serve another God. It's not like he's trying to just ignore. Well, we don't need the Lord's blessing Anyways, I'll just go off and win this battle for you know, he wasn't doing any of that He was trying to do everything that he knew needed to be done and off of the sacrifice And he's just thinking well, I mean Samos not here, but we still need to offer a sacrifice the Lord. I'll offer the sacrifice I'll give of myself. I'll do something. I know I shouldn't do but it's all for the greater good This is the mindset of King Saul, but the problem was it wasn't according to the word of the Lord It was he was breaking God's commandments in order to do that Don't ever think that something that you're doing Oh, but I'm gonna make the sacrifice and I'm gonna give and I'm gonna do this if you're breaking God's command to do it God will not be pleased at all In fact, it's gonna make God angry for you to circumvent the rules that God set up To do something that that you think he's gonna want Verse 13 and Samuel said to Saul, thou has done foolishly Thou has not kept the commandment of the Lord thy God which he commanded thee for now Would the Lord have established thy kingdom and upon Israel forever and see I think this happened because Saul was being tested Can he still Rely and trust in the word of the Lord. No, this is right No, this is right with all the pressure coming down on you with the time going a little man we're running out of time here Trust in the word of the Lord Can you trust in the word of Lord even when things get tense even when times get tight good? You know, it's easy to trust in the word of Lord when there's no pressure Right when when no one no one no one no one is is Contradicting you when no one's standing against you when there's no fight when everything's great when everything's popular To stand with God, that's easy. That's easy. I mean think about like like Saying anything publicly posting anything on social media Something that's right, but everybody agrees with that's easy Your people will make these strong says, you know pedophiles should be put to death Yeah, everyone believes that I mean still I think that's changing and it's probably gonna be a time where that will be more radical to Say that but that's one of those things that people could say. Oh, man, you know, or or you know Even just a right to life and stuff like that. Those are like so basic Concepts like you're not making some major bold stand of saying like we shouldn't be killing babies in the womb It's not that it's not that radical But How do we get to that point? How about you stand when you stand for God on the things where you know It's not popular and there's definitely gonna be pushed back on that that requires more Faith in the Word of God knowing that it's right and and just showing that you're trusting in the Word of the Lord King saw here and that's and you know, this is an apples apples necessarily, but it's the same type of thing in a sense where He was supposed to be doing what's right? He's feeling this pressure to you know, these people are leaving It's a man. I got to keep everything together here. So we're gonna step outside of what God said to do and What he did was foolish He said and and Sam what calls him out on it and says you know what you have not kept the commandment of the Lord He commanded you do not to do this He says for now where the Lord have established a kingdom upon Israel forever verse 14, but now thy kingdom shall not continue So for this that's a big deal This one thing that he did he's saying you know what now you've lost the kingdom The Lord hath sought him a man after his own heart and the Lord hath commanded him to be captain over his people because thou has not kept that which the Lord commanded thee Verse 15 says and Samuel rose and got him up from Gilgal unto Gibeah Benjamin and Saul numbered the people that were present with him About six hundred men and Saul and Jonathan son and the people that were present with them abode and Gibeah Benjamin But the Philistines encamped in Michmash. No, we're gonna we're not gonna go through the rest of this turn If you were to chapter 15, that was his first failing That was his first sin and that was a big one too. That was a big test that he failed Because here's what God's looking for God's putting someone in it, you know this position of being in a king That's a high position you you have it's you're not just responsible for yourself. We're responsible for all the people So if you're gonna make judgments That you're gonna start contradicting the word of the Lord as someone in that position God says you are not the right person for the job at all You need to have respect under the word of the Lord 100% You need to know the law of God and follow it and sin and not be willing to bend the rules But God I mean think about it politicians do this all the time They're always looking for ways to bend the rules You need to find someone with integrity if they're going to be in a position of power They're going to be a position of leadership to say we don't bend the rules they are what they are especially God's rules Chapter 15 look at verse number one the Bible reads Samuel also said unto Saul The Lord sent me to anoint thee to be king over his people over Israel now Therefore harken thou unto the voice of the words of the Lord Thus saith the Lord of hosts I remember that which Amalek did to Israel how he laid weight for him in the way when he came up from Egypt now go and smite Amalek and Utterly destroy all that they have and spare them not but slay both man and woman infant and suckling ox and sheep camel and ass clear directive wipe them out and We've seen this before from God against the Canaanites when he sent the children of Israel in to You know inherit the Promised Land. This is a similar thing where he says you know what I'm gonna bring the sins of Amalek Back on their own head. This is God's judgment where he's commanding them to do this and Specifically commanding King Saul to go forward and do this. He says you need to utterly annihilate them wipe them out I mean man woman boy girl animals all of it. Just just destroy it all they need they need to go This is total destruction Commandment from the Lord jump down verse number seven and Saul smote the Amalekites from Havilah until thou comest assure that is over against Egypt so he beat them in battle and he took a gag the king of the Amalekites alive and Utterly destroyed all the people at the edge of the sword But Saul and the people Spared a gag and and I want you to pay attention to because again, this is the narrator in verse 9 Saul and the people spared a gag because Saul is gonna try to claim in this a little bit. Well the people the narrator saying Saul and the people spared a gag and the best of the sheep and of the oxen and of the fatlings and the lambs and All that was good and would not Utterly destroy them but everything that was vile and refuse that they destroyed utterly So they took the commandment of the Lord that said utterly destroy everything Well, yeah, okay, we'll do that but I mean look sure all the garbage all the stuff that's vile and refuse Yeah, we'll utterly destroy that. I mean who wants any of that but the good stuff I mean, come on, we can't just utterly destroy this. I got an idea. I know we'll do Well utterly destroy all the people but the you know, we'll save the king To do something else with him and then you know, what are the straw animals, but you know what the good animals I mean the fatted calf, you know all this good stuff. I know we could just offer these up to the Lord That's a good idea. Let's let's sacrifice these. Look now when people would make sacrifices in the Lord You know what they got to do they partook of the sacrifices They're thinking why should we destroy all this good meat? We could have a barbecue and We'll offer it unto the Lord and we'll have a great feast and and it'll be good That's a better idea than just destroying all this stuff, right? I mean, come on and we're hey, it's all offered unto the Lord It's all sacrifice unto you God Except God didn't tell him to do that God didn't say I want you to offer up the best of what they had to me as an offering He said utterly destroy it Verse 10 then came the word of the Lord unto Samuel saying it repenteth me That I have set up Saul to be king for he has turned back from following me and hath not performed my commandments And it grieved Samuel and he cried unto the Lord all night And when Samuel rose early to meet Saul in the morning It was told Samuel saying Saul came to Carmel and behold He set him up a place and has gone about and passed on and gone down to Gilgal Samuel said came to Saul and Saul said on him blessed be thou of the Lord So he's going to meet him like there's nothing wrong again, just like last time He says this I have performed the commandment of the Lord. Hey Samuel, how's it going, buddy? Hey, I did everything I was supposed to do. I kept God's commands now Again, too many Christians today think that all right. I'm keeping God's commandments But you're really not You're looking at the commandments and saying oh, yeah, I'm not gonna say any any wicked thing before my eyes I'm not gonna say evil before my eyes Then you turn it around and doing that very thing Oh No, but you understand see it's different because you know when when I do that, it's it's not it's really not that bad It's not it's not what you think. Oh I'm just doing this for the Lord Whatever whatever the excuse and And whatever the sin You've got to look at the commandments of the Lord and not try to make the excuses and not try to find The escape of all well, it's not really a sin. Look God's Word says what it says. It's very clear He's very clear with his Commandments There's a lot of things you're just not supposed to do And a lot of things you're supposed to do They were supposed to destroy everything there was there was no misunderstanding They were supposed to destroy everything there was there was no misunderstanding and what God said there's no interpretation needed Yet they didn't do it yet here we have Saul saying I did I did I did everything verse 14 and Samuel said What meaneth then this bleeding of the sheep in mine ears and lowing of the oxen which I hear then? That's funny. You did everything. How come I could hear these animals? I Mean, is that where they heard his animals come from? What is that? And Saul said they have brought them from the Amalekites for the people for the people Spared the best of the sheep and of the oxen to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God in the rest We have utterly destroyed. Well, hold on a second there Saul The rest you but I thought God said to destroy everything Yeah, he did Then Samuel said unto Saul stay and I will tell you what the Lord had said to me this night. He said unto him say on Samuel said when thou was little in thine own sight was thou not made the head of the tribes of Israel and the Lord anointed thee king over Israel and The Lord sent thee on a journey and said go and utterly destroy the sinners the Amalekites and fight against them until they be consumed Wherefore then didst thou not obey the voice of the Lord, but that's fly upon the spoil and it's evil in the sight of the Lord Then why did you do this God strictly commanded you to destroy why didn't you do it? You've done evil. You didn't obey verse 20 and Saul said to Samuel. Yea, I have obeyed the voice of the Lord so now he's just really digging in and Saying no, look I did obey And this is a big big big big big problem when you're confronted with your sin when someone's showing you look This is what God said and you didn't do that and you're like, but no I did do that Yeah have obeyed the voice of the Lord have gone the way which the Lord sent me and have brought a gag the king of Amalek and Have utterly destroyed the Amalekites He's just the king of Amalekite back. I killed the Amalekites Verse 21, but the people so notice again, what a great leader, huh? What a great leader. Oh, but the people Imagine me as a pastor of this church. I'm supposed to be a leader, right? And Maybe our church does something and I'm trying to think of an example off the fly here Just don't we do something just completely unbiblical right and And then me as leader. I'm going well, I mean the people wanted to do that And I didn't really want to do that. I mean, I know what the Bible says I know we shouldn't be doing that but all the people wanted to do that and just throw everybody else under the bus What a horrible leader leadership that is Look man, you did something wrong. You're the one in charge. You're the one leading You don't blame it on the people if the people wanted to you know, offer the sacrifice and save the king alive It's your job leader to say no, that's not what God said I mean if the people want to do, you know all the people the church they want to do this They want to bring in the rock music They want to do that But I know we shouldn't be bringing that stuff in because I know that's you know, that's not that's not of God We shouldn't be doing that. But hey, I mean I just did it anyways because you know, the people wanted it Not a job not a job to be a politician It's your job to obey God So he blames the people again verse 21 But the people took of the spoil sheep and oxen the chief of the things Which should have been utterly now he's starting to admit knows a little it should have been utterly destroyed To sacrifice unto Lord thy God and notice how he says the Lord thy God Not the Lord my God not the Lord our God the Lord thy God now I'm not saying he didn't see the goddess, you know, the Lord is his God. I'm not saying that at all He's making it more personal for saying like hey your God. I mean look look we're bringing sacrifices for your God Right like to China and treat more make it more personal to him That's what I think at least obviously his phrase is used a lot But the way that he's using it here just seems You know We're gonna use this to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God and Gilgal and Samuel said that the Lord is great delight and burnt offerings And sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord behold to obey is better than sacrifice And to harken than the fad of Rams So, you know what God really wants. He doesn't want all your sacrifices He doesn't want you saving all the best of all the sheep and cattle and separating and bringing up to God for this great sacrifice He just wants you to obey him And you know another illustration is as a parent, you know what your parents want from their kids They just want them to obey. Do you really as a parent? Do you want your kids like? Making all these sacrifices for you as their dad or you as their mom. Like do you really just want them? Investing all this time and effort and energy into just like well look I made this for you At the sacrifice at the expense of not listening to what you told them to do Right, like like you tell your kid. Hey, I want you you need you need to clean your room and do your school And then they spend all their time Building some arts and crafts for you. But look daddy. You know, like like I love you. Here you go Okay, that's nice But that's not what I told you to do Right, it's better. It's better Just obey when you're told to do something Than it is to try to offer up some great sacrifice because God doesn't need your sacrifice God never asked you for your sacrifice, you know, he Commanded you to do certain things Obey them now. Look, there's nothing wrong with a sacrifice in itself The poem comes in is when you sacrifice at the expense of obedience Right, you can obey and sacrifice You can follow God's commandments and offer say hey look I also did this for you just like a child can take their time and and do something nice for their parents That's gonna be well appreciated When they've already obeyed and listened then it's great Then it's pleasing. It's like the free will offering for the Lord. Oh great. That's that's fine You know God, but even that God as you know, the free will offering God is designated how to do it It's like Cain and Abel. Cain bought his best out of the grave. That's not what God said. That's not what God wanted Do it the way he wants Obeying is better than sacrifice Verse 23 for rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft. Now the sin of witchcraft was another capital crime and And Stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord. He hath also rejected thee from being king So we're seeing here Look, you don't want to listen to the Word of God. You don't want that to be your ruler Well, then you're not going to be king It's as simple as that and Saul said unto Samuel I have so he finally admits I have sinned Okay, good You ought to admit that For I've transgressed the commandment of the Lord and thy words because I feared the people and obeyed their voice So finally comes out like, you know what? I was afraid of the people instead of being afraid of God They're making some progress here with them, but but it's it's very shallow Verse 25 now therefore, I pray thee pardon my sin and turn again with me that I may worship the Lord and Samuel said unto Saul I will not return with thee for thou hast rejected the word of the Lord and the Lord has rejected thee from being king over Israel They're saying yeah. Yeah. Okay, I sin, you know, I'm sorry, but just come back with me and let's you know And Sam was like no look you don't assume that you understand how serious this is. I'm not returning with you and Then after going back and forth a little bit jump down verse 30 says then he said I have sinned yet honor me now I pray thee before the elders of my people So, what does he really care about he just said it admitted I feared the people more than I feared God That's why I did this. Yes, I sin. Yes, I did wrong. He said but you know what still just let me let me look good In front of the same people that I feared That shows you what he cares more about Even when he's called out on it, he still wants to save face Instead of going I Sinned Okay, and this just needs to be obvious and just get it out in the open you know I sin and be more caring about what God thinks and getting right with God than whatever the people think and Even as a leader even in front of everybody you need to just be able to say You know what I sin and I'm gonna get right with God And even if that means you don't save face you own what you do you own your mistakes And that's what God really wants This is why I think and this is a pivotal moment That he's asking for this honor before the others everything else Because if you go over to chapter 16 now, this is we're gonna start seeing the evil spirit from the Lord This is this is essentially when it starts God gave him opportunity now. He still was gonna remove him from being king, but he didn't have to make matters worse for himself But this lack of true repentance this plagues him for the rest of his life this still thinking that he's right thinking that he needs to keep doing what he's doing and and and Now trying to retain His title in his office that he no longer Has rightfully by God he's still trying to cling to that by any means possible So now when the threat becomes David since he's the one that God chose. He's always trying to kill him And he's always going after him and you know And he has this obsession with not wanting to give up his control and his power that's gone to his head Because he used to be humble in his own eyes and little his own his eyes But as soon as he got that power He got taste of that and that lifted him up with pride and blinded him and and then he only cared about retaining power Which is why he cared about what the people thought not what God thought Even to this point of going no just honor me now before the elders Because he wanted to keep his position and his status in front of the people for as long as he possibly could That's what he cared about verse 6 chapter 16 look at verse number 13, I'm trying to get through this I'm gonna try to get there's a little bit quicker because there's a lot of notes when we study the the life of Saul Verse 13 then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brethren and The Spirit of Lord came upon David from that day forward so Samuel rose up and went to Rhema but the Spirit of Lord departed from Saul and an evil spirit from the Lord troubled him and Saul's servants said unto him behold now an evil spirit from God troubleth thee So no longer is the Spirit of Lord You know Resting or you know being upon Saul where he's being blessed of God and and kind of led and directed now God's removed that and instead he's replaced that with an evil spirit it's an evil spirit from God and It's going to trouble him and vex him and And kind of drive him mad or drive him crazy in a sense that he's being vexed by this evil spirit from the Lord now The solution to this problem because he realizes and understands he has a problem with God I Mean who's the source of the problem here Saul's a source of the problem But who he has a problem with he has a problem with God no one else It's not a problem with David. It's not probably to be it's a problem between Saul and God Because Saul's not repentant because Saul is not Respecting the commandments of the Lord and he's not making that his guide and his ruler. He wants to do things his own way So he ends up being troubled by the Lord now instead of any rational person should at this point Especially if you're starting to get chase in you get an evil spirit from Lord Should be able to recognize and say you know what I better get right with God I mean, that's what the problem is how else you think you're gonna get around this problem Then by dealing with it face I'm just the only way to properly deal with this problem and actually solve it and say you know what I need to get right With God, but instead he doesn't get right with God instead He tries to find another solution outside of getting right with God outside of being it having to humble himself and repent So you know what? Wow, I can't believe I've fallen so low That God is doing this to me Instead, you know his servants give him this great idea of finding someone to play music to make that that evil spirit go away I don't want to be troubled. I don't like the way I feel. I don't like this guilty conscience. I don't like feeling this way So I'm gonna try to distract myself with something else so I could just feel better and Then I don't have to worry about this evil spirits verse 16 says let our Lord now command thy servants which are before thee To seek out a man who is a cunning play art and harp and it shall come to pass when the evil spirit from God is upon thee that he shall play with his hand and thou shalt be well and Saul said unto his servants provide me now a man that can play well and bring him to me Then answered one of the servants and said behold. I have seen a son of Jesse the Bethlemite That is cunning and playing and a mighty valiant man and a man of war and prudent in matters and a comely person And the Lord is with him Wherefore Saul sent messengers unto Jesse and said send me David thy son Which is with the sheep and Jesse took an ass laden with bread and a bottle of wine and a kid had sent them by David his son unto Saul and David came to Saul and stood before him He loved him greatly and he became his armor bearer And so this is this is so early on obviously where Saul has a has a liking to David He sees them as a great. It's a great idea. So I'll had his own problems with God before David even shows up on the scene with Saul Saul is you know, but he what he ends up doing is trying to make David be the focal point of his problems and taking things out on David instead of dealing with his problems with God and Obvious is really bad for David then who ends up being in the life of Saul to be the object of The anger and the resentment and the problems that he's having with God now look I bring this up for another reason is because You know, we live our lives with other people your marriage kids, whatever If you allow yourself Oftentimes people do this you get you get into a place where you're not willing to recognize your own sin It's clear in the Bible, you know, you're wrong, but you don't want to admit it and you don't want to get right with God What ends up happening is that when people are in that position oftentimes they'll take things out on someone else who really isn't the problem at all and You start you know Your sin starts having an impact that on other people's lives other people have nothing to do with your real problem And you start taking it out on them instead of dealing with it the right way David wasn't David wasn't doing anything wrong He was just trying to do everything right trying to live his life. He's trying to serve God Trying to serve God obey his commandments the best he can try to be righteous and then you've got Saul at first, right? This is great. Oh cool. Great. He's here But after a while after time goes on Saul still isn't dealing with this problem It's getting worse instead of better these little fixes of having David play this music for him Like it says here in verse 23 and it came to pass when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul that David took in Harp and played his hand So Saul was refreshed and was well and the evil spirit depart from this only works for so long Because after a while what we see is then when David starts to play He still has the evil spirit and he's throwing javelins at David Trying to kill him and trying to take out his problems on somebody else Now Saul this is ending up like adding iniquity unto iniquity at this point and I you know would encourage you stress you if you ever Find yourself this position you start lashing out of people that you love Because of your own sins, you know, you're just making things a lot worse for yourself In the long run here you got you got to deal with your own problems and stop taking them out of other people Yeah, it's never fun to face your own Problems as far as admitting that you've done wrong, but that's the only way through the only way to really deal with the problems Otherwise, it doesn't go away It didn't go away for King Saul Until the day of his death he had a problem with the Lord the entire time And you think of well how many years was that and how much Misdirection of his life and focus and going after the wrong people and fighting all these fights and in causing all his problem If he would have just humbled himself and gotten right with God how different Could things have been first for the rest of his life? I Want to skip some of this stuff because I've got a lot of notes here Go to Chapter 22 I Want to make a point of this as well as we follow the life of Saul I'm trying to do that. I'm kind of spending more time in the weeds here but won't My original plan is a bit a little bit more high-level on a lot of this stuff because it's really interesting when you see the pattern of events because I've seen this pattern play out in other people before I have and Usually you see it play out without knowing That someone necessarily is in sin at first like you don't you don't know because you could kind of see some of the things But you don't you just don't know and oftentimes you don't find out until a little bit later But then I see the patterns just like wow, that's amazing how this how this works out right and We see all these things here. We studies sinking Saul a good verse number six of first Samuel 22 because now we're gonna start seeing Saul starting to become increasingly paranoid and This is what happens when you have the self-centered You know, everything's about you. It's not about other people. He's worried about himself He's you know, he's he's taking things out on the wrong people he's not getting right with God with himself So now he's starting to think everyone's after him poor Saul poor victim Nobody loves me Look just get right with God Just kid right with God. It'll solve all your problems verse 6 and when Saul heard that David was discovered and the men that were with him now Saul abode and Gibeah under a tree and Rhema having a spear in his hand and All his servants were standing about him then Saul said unto his servants that stood about him here now you benjamites well the son of Jesse give every one of you fields and vineyards and make you all captains of thousands and captains of hundreds that All of you have conspired against me and there is none that showeth me that my son have made a league with the son of Jesse and there is none of you that is sorry for me Or showeth unto me that my son has stirred up my servant against me to lie and wait as at this day I Talk about conspiracy theorists here. He's thinking that everyone's against him. It's like no David is trying to save his own life from you and to stay away from you and You keep going after him, but see here's where the the love the joy the peace the comfort. It's all gone from him He's not walking in spirit. He's not right with God. He's got a really bad relationship with God right now So everything he's not standing on solid ground. He doesn't have a solid foundation He at any moment he's worried about just losing everything But when you're right with God and when you're walking right with God, you don't have to worry about a thing you can walk boldly you can walk confidently, you know, you're doing what's right and All these problems go away and then you have to worry about being paranoid man Is everyone out to get me who you know, they're gonna find out they're gonna you know, whatever like This is what happens the further you let these things Fester and get worse the the the more the cancer just builds and grows the cancer of sin of Rebellion of being stiff-necked of not wanting to face your own problems Grows and gets worse and starts to impact more and more people jump down to verse number 13 and Saul said unto him Why have you conspired against me thou and the son of Jesse and that thou hast given him bread now This is where he's talking to the priest or he goes in and and finds out that he was there David's leaving like he's just trying to escape for his life and Of course he goes he goes to the temple and is like well, you know Can you just give me some food for my guys and he ends up getting the sword that that he took from Goliath that he? Literally, he was Goliath sword if it's rightful for anyone to be rightful for David anyways to take that sword since he's the one That's Luke Goliath But he was already as far as anyone knew was in good standing with the king I mean, he was the king's servant. He is like his right-hand man. He's someone who's going out and fighting battles for the king so the him Alex like What am I supposed to do? I miss David like your Leader here that that's leading your army and leading your troops and into victory in the battle It's up like he asked for some bread and a sword. What do you want me to do? but here's the the accusation from Saul you've conspired against me as If a him Lex now trying to overthrow Saul and encouraging David to do this and blessing him or whatever His wife you conspired against me thou and the son of Jesse and that thou has given him bread and a sword and has Inquired of God for him that he should rise against me to lie and wait as at this day So the first two parts were right He gave him bread and a sword But he didn't inquire of God for him to rise up against him that didn't happen at all he just conjured that up in his own mind thinking everyone's against me and He's definitely David's not lying in wait for Saul at all Verse 14 then him like answered the king and said and who is so faithful among all my servants is David say well, I mean If I'm gonna help anyone out isn't David like your most trusted faithful servant Which is the king's son-in-law and go with it thy bidding and is honorable in thine house. Like He's not some crook and some criminal. He's I mean, he's your own son-in-law Did I then begin to inquire of God for him So now he's addressing, you know, the false accusation like I didn't inquire of God for him Let not the king impute anything unto his servant Nor to all the house of my father for thy servant knew nothing of all this lesson was like I didn't have I didn't know Anything about this him. Let's tell him the truth. He doesn't know what's going on Verse 16 and the king said thou shalt surely die a him like thou and all thy father's house And the king said on the footman that stood about him turn and slay the priests of the Lord Because their hand also is with David and because they knew when he fled and did not show it to me But the servants of the king would not put forth their hand to fall upon the priests of the Lord So good on the servants here that didn't listen to this wicked order to kill the priests But you could see how far Saul has fallen Now he's taking things out on the priests The priests of the Lord I mean got like He's not only killing him like he's gonna he's willing to kill everybody there So when his own servants when the people who are of Israel wouldn't listen to him it says in the king said to doe egg Doe egg the Edomite He's like some mercenary here turn now and fall upon the priests and doe egg the Edomite turned and he fell upon the priests and Slew on that day four score and five persons that did wear linen ephod Eighty five people eighty five priests died under the command of King Saul by doe egg the Edomite That's pretty bad now This is worse I would say than what David did But the evil spirit that came on Saul happened way before this This is where I'm just so you understand when we're talking about God's a an evil spirit on someone who's saved What he had done before he I mean was definitely wrong. He just he completely disregarded disobeyed the commandments of God But because he just refused to get right He just gets worse and worse and kind of continues this downward spiral of sin to the point where now it's like He's killed 85 He went to go see the seer back when he was looking you know back when he was simple back when he was looking To just find the asses that that had you know escaped or whatever He's trying to find these animals and they went and found all we need to bring a gift to the seer to help me if you would have said You know and so and so many years you're gonna kill 85 priests of the Lord. He probably would have said you're nuts Like there's no way I would ever do that Way back earlier on and here we see him Commanding nope you and all your house are being killed Blinded By sin blinded by pride blinded by a stiff neck and not getting right with the Lord Flip over to chapter 28 Now this is Where we see Saul dying being killed being judged and paying for his with his life ultimately First Number three the Bible reads now Samuel was dead and all Israel had lamented him and buried him and Rhema even in his own city and Saul had put away those that had familiar spirits and the Wizards out of the land and the Philistines gathered themselves together and came and pitched and Shoon him and Saul gathered all Israel together and they pitched in a Gilboa and When Saul saw the host of the Philistines he was afraid and his heart greatly trembled I Mentioned before without when you're not walking in the spirit. You've got no foundation Samuel's dead Samuel was at least a light He was the last judge of Israel before they they wanted a king Samuel was at least a light of truth and hope in Israel for following the Lord He's gone So now you've got King Saul Not wanting to give up his power But now he's facing another great army from the Philistines and he's in his fearful He's afraid it says his heart greatly trembled. You've got no confidence in God. Of course, you're gonna be afraid Of course, you're gonna be fearful if you've got a problem with being fearful just in general I mean just just anyone you have you said problems with fear and being overwhelmed or overcome with fear. I mean some people do You Need to learn to trust God get in the Word of God believe his promises Because you have no reason to be afraid you have no reason to fear if you're right with God. There is no reason to fear Take a take a survey of your life. Are you doing are you taking heed to the commandments of the Lord and not just justifying your sin Because when you start making excuses for yourself You may find yourself in this position where you all of a sudden now you're just getting afraid of things that you shouldn't never be afraid of Verse 6 isn't when Saul inquired of the Lord the Lord answered him not Neither by dreams nor by Urim nor by prophets So Saul got himself to the point to where now he's trying to ask God, you know for help And God say no what I'm gonna laugh when your fear cometh This is how Saul's pushed it with with the Lord Yeah, you're afraid now aren't you oh, yeah now you want to seek me Funny you didn't really want to see you didn't care what I said before when you broke my commandments You didn't care what I thought when you feared the people. Oh Now now you want now you want my advice now you want to know what's right No answer I'm not gonna answer you a Saved person going to God looking for direction. No answer Don't dig your ditch And get to this point to where you get to the point where God's not gonna gonna be helping you out anymore Scary place to be he really is a scary place to be First so so what does Saul even do here? Does he recognize he must have a problem with God if God is just not wanting to have anything to do with them No He wants what he wants So he's gonna try to find another way even if it's wrong and sinful to get what he wants This is how Saul operated Saved guy This is what he did Says number seven then said Saul no servant seek me a woman at the familiar spirit that I may go to her and inquire of her and a servant said to him behold there is a woman at the familiar spirit at Endor and Saul disguised himself and put on another raiment And he went and two men with him and they came to the woman by night And he said I pray thee divine unto me by the familiar spirit and bring me him up whom I shall name under thee Jump down to verse number 14 You know, she calls up Samuel Says number 14 and he said unto her What form is he of after she sees him and she said an old man cometh up and he's covered with a mantle and Saul perceived that it was Samuel and He stooped with his face to the ground and bowed himself and Samuel said to Saul Why is thou disquieted me to bring me up and Saul answered I am sore distress. And by the way I'll talk about the narrator of the Bible earlier This is again the narrator saying and Samuel said to Saul this isn't the witch speaking This isn't anyone else speaking this is the narrative Bible saying Samuel said to Saul This is Samuel speaking to Saul I'm not saying that witchcraft, you know works in the sense of you could normally do this But in this instance God is you know, it's allowed this to happen and Samuel is speaking to Saul Normally and this is obviously and I don't want to get into that very way over time This is obviously out of the norm for what this witch is used to This is totally different. She was scared. She's just like whoa. Does it you know not normal for what she normally does She normally could deal with Devils or whatever. She does and her witchcraft. This was different So Samuel said to Saul why is that disquieted me to bring me up and Saul answered I am sort of stressed for the Felicians Make war against me and God has departed from me and answer with me No, no more now that my prophets know by dreams Therefore I've called thee that thou mayest make known unto me what I shall do you say well You know these people the Felicians are coming to invade And I don't know what to do and God's not answering me. So I figured I'd call you Samuel You tell me what to do Then say it then said Samuel Careful, then this I'll ask of me seeing the Lord is departed for me has become thine enemy So then why what do you think I'm gonna do if God's your enemy if God's not answering you? What in the world do you think I'm gonna do for you? And The Lord hath done to him as he spake by me for the Lord hath rent the kingdom out of thine hand And given it to thy neighbor even to David verse 18 because thou obey. It's not the voice of the Lord Nor execute. It's his fierce wrath upon Amalek therefore hath the Lord done this thing unto thee this day Moreover the Lord will also deliver Israel with thee into the hand of the Philistines and tomorrow shall thou and thy sons be with me The Lord also shall deliver the host of Israel into the hand of the Philistines so Saul ends up dying. He dies for his transgression. He dies because he didn't obey the voice of the Lord He didn't ever get right with God and he went and asked counsel of a witch To see and that's why God just said it's enough It's enough and he ended his life on earth now I'm gonna close with this because there's other examples of this Saul's just a good example There's a lot of things that happen in Saul's life We get a lot of detail on these different things and how things get worse and worse and worse and we need to use this example as something that you don't ever want to come close to being to and We call as you saw, you know, a lot of people say oh now I would never be like Saul I would never be like that Take heed lest you fall But everyone to think if he standeth take heed lest you fall Saul's not just some reprobate unsaved guy or whatever The saved guy Other people same thing the Bible says in James 4 Verse 3 ye ask and receive not because you ask amiss They may consume it upon your lusts ye adulterous and adulterous is know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God Saul was called an enemy of God and he was a saved guy James chapter 4 says hey, you want to be a friend of the world then you're at enmity with God. You're God's enemy It doesn't make you unsaved. But you know what? I don't want to be in a position of being an enemy of God ever Ever that's a losing fight Things will not end well for you Problem is sin often causes people to dig in it did it for Saul Asa did the same thing He didn't want to be corrected. He ended up oppressing people when when he was told hey why did you go to the king of Syria instead of relying on Lord and He was just like he you know, the the the seer the prophet that came to him and rebuked him He cast him into prison. They kind of want to hear what you got to say and even you know Jonah is a similar example as far as Not wanting to do what God commanded him to do and then God having to chase in him and you know And Jonah kind of had a bad attitude through a lot of it as well Now Jonah at least did what he was commanded to do But you know we as believers your eyes preach on the fear of the Lord We need to have fear of the Lord and Catch yourself before you wreck yourself Okay, I can't say that without laughing I'm sorry Seriously though you need to be able to spot when you're when you're getting into these problems Have a humble heart and be able to repent and get right with God okay, do it because Don't go down the path of Saul. You may find an evil spirit from God plaguing you and If that ever happens get right with God don't try to find other worldly solutions to your problems oh I've got problems with You know being scared or depressed or whatever else and you're gonna go to the psychologist a psychiatrist and find like other Medication and in this music or partying or drugs or whatever to try to get rid of your problem It's not gonna help When you got a spiritual problem when you got a problem with God you got to deal with its spiritual You got to get right with God you have to finally Fess up and recognize and say you know what I haven't been right with God for however long And if you're at the point where God's playing you with an evil spirit It's been a while because the Lord is long-suffering and merciful, and if you're getting to this point like King Saul was at You got to just Step up and confront your sin and say and confront God say I'm sorry and get right It's power eyes have a word of prayer dear Lord. We love you. We thank you so much for your word God I pray to you. Please help us all to Have humility in our hearts I Pray that you would open up our eyes to the areas that we wouldn't have secret sins Or you know sins that are unknown to us. Well. We want to do. What's right and Lord help us to See the the full Impact of our own sinfulness and in our lives and in the lives of others and help us to to be able to Confront them and make the changes and get right with you Lord help us through that. Please be merciful and long-suffering with us We truly love you. We want to we want to do. What's right, and it's in Jesus name. We pray amen All right, we're gonna sing one last song before dismissed brother Peter, please lead us Open up your hymnals. Psalm number 426 Psalm 426 I heard the bells on Christmas Day Psalm 426 I Is Oh Oh Amen racing you thank you so much for coming You