Broken Faith
Notes
Transcript
Intro
Intro
Intro Story
Intro Story
There was a teenager who grew up in the church, he heard the sermons preached, sang all the songs, yet he was living in sin. He was addicted to pornography, he was messing around with the wrong people and even when he knew God was real, he chose not to seek his guidance and instead decided that life wasn’t worth living anymore…
This teenager, was me, before Christ showed me hope that I didn’t have to liven in this Broken Faith anymore.
Proposition
Proposition
My aim today is to show you in the text 2 descriptions of how we break faith with God and why that should concern us but end with a hope, a way out, that is only found in Christ.
those 2 faith breakers are:
Disobedience
Waywardness
Background
Background
This morning we find our selves in the book of 1 Chronicles. Not typically a book that us believers really spend much time in when we study but nevertheless it is a book full of rich truth and history of the people of God in the old testament. The book of 1 Chronicles actually runs parallel to 1 Samuel but, the author chose how exactly to tell the stories that come from 1 Samuel to his theological aim for the audience. Another important note is that the audience was primarily leaders of the post Babylon exile restored community of Israel by focusing on past leaders of Israel like King Saul in our passage today.
Something you need to know about Saul before we jump in is that the people of Israel were begging for a king, they wanted an earthly King and even though Samuel kept telling them the downsides of having a King, the Lord ordained a king and the first one was our man today, Saul.
The author gave us a commentary at the end in verses 13 and 14 that we are going to focus heavily on and use it to understand what happened in this tragic event where the first king of Israel was killed.
Those verses read:
So Saul died for his breach of faith. He broke faith with the Lord in that he did not keep the command of the Lord, and also consulted a medium, seeking guidance. He did not seek guidance from the Lord. Therefore the Lord put him to death and turned the kingdom over to David the son of Jesse.
Point 1
Point 1
The first description of how we break faith with God is Disobedience… Disobedience…
The story here is a story of a battle between Israel and Philistines. Right out the gate without wasting a breath the writer says that the men of Israel fled before the Philistines and fell slain on Mount Gilboa. What we see throughout this telling of the story of the battle is absolute defeat not just simply a struggle in battle but a complete defeat with no real battle.
This emphasis is important because it helps us understand one crucial thing, Saul and his army were completely hopeless in this battle.
We see this Philistine army take more control and kill 3 of the Sons of Saul as the battle pressed harder and harder against him till he was wounded from one of the archers. Then after his armor-bearer refuses to take his life, Saul falls on his own sword and died…
These were the people of God no? why would this happen to those who were God’s?
Verse 13 gives us the answer,
1 Chronicles 10:13 (ESV)
So Saul died for his breach of faith.
The Chronicles do something interesting when it comes to battles. Victories pointed to the fidelity of God by showing how great the army was against them and how the odds were stacked against them to really show that God was sovereign over that victory.
But, with defeats, the author’s emphasis is on these defeats as divine judgment for something, for some kind of Sin. Not that all bad things in life are because of a specific direct sin, but these instances are. Well, what sin was it? Verse 13 continues:
1 Chronicles 10:13 (ESV)
He broke faith with the Lord in that he did not keep the command of the Lord
Saul broke faith by disobedience… Disobedience to a command God had for him.
Samuel actually tells Saul in 1 Samuel 28:18 that the reason for this all to happen, is because Saul “did not obey the voice of the Lord and did not carry out his fierce wrath against Amalek.
So what happened with Amalek?
I will keep this brief since it isn’t our text but earlier in 1 Samuel 15, The Lord had a will to judge Amalek, another people of that day, for their actions against Israel, and commanded Saul, right after his anointment as king by the way, to
Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.’ ”
God made a command and expects it to be carried out. Saul goes and carries out the command, almost completely, but instead of devoting ALL to destruction he chose to take Agag the king of those people alive and also chose to keep the best of the sheep and oxen, fattened calves, and lambs and sacrificed it to the Lord. Samuel rebuked him but Saul was like “what are you talking about I went on the mission as God commanded but just changed a few things and Samuel said this:
1 Samuel 15:22 (ESV)
“Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices,
as in obeying the voice of the Lord?
Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice,
and to listen than the fat of rams.
Don’t we do that sometimes? Sometimes we think that we can take what God has told us to do and we decide what we think is important to the point and leave the rest out?
It is like in April when you finish your taxes and you decide to lie and write off more expenses than you really are allowed to because you want to “give more to the church”. As if it is ok to disobey the command to pay what you owe and to specifically pay our taxes as they are owed for the excuse that you are going to worship God with it. God doesn’t want you to worship him by literally sinning against him to do it, he would rather you follow what he has commanded of you.
Saul didn’t obey God’s command, plain and simple, and in that same text Samuel told him that because of his sin, he has been rejected as king and God regretted that he made Saul King and has plans for a new king to take his place, David. And here, in our story today, is the final battle that out of judgment for Saul and his actions and disobedience, Israel was given over to the Philistines.
Saul died that day, him and his whole house as it says. Now if you know anything about Saul you would know that he actually has a son that is not listed here so the intention is not to say that everyone in his family were killed but that the Dynasty of Saul has ended this day.
When the people of Israel saw that Saul and his sons were dead, they fled and abandoned their cities. This language is significant because land was very important to the Hebrew people and them leaving their homes and running shows that the people were under judgment because of Saul’s actions.
When we sin, when we disobey what God has called us to do, it has downstream effects to those closest to us and even more broadly to those in our groups around us.
The sons of Saul died, they were not the ones who sinned, if anything Jonathan was highly regarded in many ways through scripture for his faith and even realized the rightful heir of David, but he too died in this battle because Saul was punished for his sin.
You can see this clearly in adulterous sins like Pornography. When you chose to click and satisfy your desires in that way, the consequences for that sin and the discipline don’t just affect you, they affect your spouse, your family, maybe even those close to you who look up to you as a mentor. Sin has downstream affects because Sin is against God but it also hurts people not just ourselves.
We see an interesting little insert here in our text after the Philistines have taken the plunder and taken the bodies and the head of Saul and paraded around worshiping their Idols for their victory, these people called Jabesh-gilead took back the body of Saul and his sons and gave them a proper burial, if you are like me that makes you ask, who are they?
Well the beginning of their story is that they were a city of the nation of Israel that when called to stand up and fight against another people who did ill to Israel, they did not fight and ultimately were greatly punished for that. Later, after rebuilding their city, a battle brewed against them and Saul lead his men in to that battle to destroy the enemy saving the Jabesh-gilead people and then we get to our story today.
What we see here is a story of hope, that even though they were judged for disobedience, they were given another chance to do good for the people of God and after repaying that good that Saul, through the Lord, accomplished for them, David later blessed them for it. Even though you have sinned before, God made a way that you do not have to go on sinning but can walk in faith.
Sin has nasty effects, it hurts us, it hurts God, it hurts those closest to us. But God made a way that sin doesn’t have to put us to death like Saul. That is that Christ went to death on our behalf, in our stead Christ Jesus came down living perfect without sin to pay the judgment that we deserved for our disobedience on the cross raising 3 days later in victory which we will talk more about here at the end.
Point 2
Point 2
The second description of how we break faith with God is waywardness… waywardness…
What is waywardness? It is when someone becomes resistant to guidance, disobedient to God's Word, perverse and willful in their ungodly conduct.
Remember I told you we were going to use verses 13 and 14 as a lens for understanding these truths so lets look at the later part of 13 and into 14 which says:
1 Chronicles 10:13–14 (ESV)
and also consulted a medium, seeking guidance. He did not seek guidance from the Lord. Therefore the Lord put him to death and turned the kingdom over to David the son of Jesse.
We learned of one of the ways that Saul disobeyed God which lead to his death but this was a 2 part reason and the other was this issue of consulting a medium.
Now a medium is apart of the occult who is able to connect with someone who is already dead. That is where the word medium comes from, they are the in-between for you and someone who has passed.
If you are hear and you are currently consulting mediums and using their services I am pleading with you to stop now and I will explain why.
The story where Saul consulted a medium is actually from the same text I mentioned earlier in 1 Samuel 28 where I said that Samuel told Saul that he was going to die in this battle for is disobedience.
Yeah, that was Saul speaking through a medium to an already dead Samuel…
Saul at this point in history has banished all mediums from Israel and even after doing that, he consulted one himself because when he had inquired after God, he did not get an answer by any of the ways he may have in the past and so instead of continuing to seek after God, he takes matter in to his own hands and gets a medium involved to give him guidance because the Philistines were camping near by.
Lets stop for a second though and understand how God feels about this practice. Lev19:31 says
“Do not turn to mediums or necromancers; do not seek them out, and so make yourselves unclean by them: I am the Lord your God.
Or Lev20:6 that says:
“If a person turns to mediums and necromancers, whoring after them, I will set my face against that person and will cut him off from among his people.
God hates this practice and he still does today, but why? Well our text makes clear the problem with it because it seeks guidance from another source than God himself. The bible tells us that God is a jealous God, not jealous like we may be jealous in sinful way through envy, no it is righteous and holy coming from God’s covenant relationship with his people who are rightfully his. When you seek after guidance from other places like Saul did, you are not relying on God and are a wayward person. You are being resistant to God’s guidance thinking that you can somehow do better than the creator of all things.
Something else that is important to notice is that Saul did inquire God but what did Saul do? after not hearing an answer, he did something his own way.
Church, we do this, and we do it too much…
We are so impatient, we all live in this instant gratification world where anything we want is just a tap away and will be here same day from amazon prime. But when we seek after God, sometimes, we don’t feel like he has really given us an answer, and maybe he really hasn’t… But… The mark of a believer who relies on the Lord, is one who waits for the Lord.
I will say that again, The mark of a believer who relies on the Lord, is one who waits for the Lord…
Church, a moment to the Lord is like a 1,000 years to us. God answers and does what he wills when he wills it. If you are saved by the sacrifice by Jesus on the cross and have confessed him as Lord in your heart, than you have nothing to be concerned about, even when you think God is not going to guide you, he still does.
When you think he won’t get you through that hard conversation with your parents who don’t agree with your faith, he does.
When you feel like God can’t help you through this lonely season when your kids have left your home… he will.
When you have lost your job and don’t think God can help you get through this stress… he will.
When you think that he won’t get you through this toddler period where it feels like your house is overrun by small humans, he will.
When you feel like he won’t bring you through this tough season in your marriage… HE WILL.
If you are in the room and you don’t know the Lord, this kind of assurance is available to those who put their faith in Jesus. Jesus died on the cross because of your disobedience and waywardness what does he ask for in return? Belief, that is all, faith. As a matter of fact, he will give you that faith which means that there is nothing you can do to earn that grace, nor to take it away. That is why it is a gift.
That may already sound like hope, and I would agree that is hope but when I started out this message I intended more hope than just this. The end of our text says
“Therefore the Lord put him to death and turned the kingdom over to David the son of Jesse.”
David was also, like Saul, a man who even had many sins that we don’t have time to get into today but he was considered a man after God’s own heart and you know what else he was? A king who hundreds of years down the line would have a descendant whose name was Jesus of Nazareth.
God had a plan guys… Back then, the battle was fought with flesh and blood, but Ephesians 6:12 tells us:
For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
And guess who had victory over all those powers and authorities through his death resurrection and ascension? Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the God Man.
Through Christ, there is no battle that he does not already have the victory. He is what Saul, David, you, and me could never be… Perfect. He never disobeyed God and trusted fully in the guidance of God the Father, so what better man to be crowned eternal king, Lord of Lords, than Jesus who is also called Emmanuel, God with us.
Listen to this truth from Romans 8:37-39 that says:
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
This is our hope. Christ, not Saul, not David, not Melo, not Trump, not Kamala… Christ.
To wrap this up, the truth is, we have broken faith with God many times by our disobedience and waywardness. Whether that is not being honest on our taxes, or hating on a brother or sister in christ for their political beliefs. Or maybe it is being unfaithful in your marriage, or provoking our children to anger… regardless of the sin, regardless of what we have done against the Lord God, there is grace for us when we repent of this sin, when we turn away from our sin, when we follow the guidance of the Lord and stop leaning on our own understanding.
Unbeliever, all this talk about battles and spiritual powers may make you think us christians are talking crazy, but I implore you to hear the truth that Jesus did die on the cross and 3 days later he did raise from the dead and indeed he is coming back again to judge the living and the dead. He died so that you don’t have to be punished for your own Sin and you may wonder why anyone would do that… it is because he loved you, that’s why. It is a free gift, no charge, put your faith in him, and all this victory stuff I am talking about, will be for you as well.
