When Opportunity Knocks

the scripture reading today 2nd Corinthians chapter 11 verse 14 It says Satan himself masquerades as an angel of Light. Will you pray with me?

Heavenly Father

and I pray that you would open our hearts to you to your word in this moment. got that Whatever the enemy might use to distract us to try and steal the word from being planted in our hearts God that you would. It just stopped his efforts. Father that you would draw us closer to you in this moment as we come to your word.

There isn't a person here. Who is Worthy.

Did you receive your words and yet you speak to us because you love us. Help us to see what a holy moment. This is.

To give glory and honor and praise and thanks to you.

Jesus Christ for your love for us that we see through him. before your word Jesus name I pray If you brought your Bibles, you may be seated. If you brought your Bibles turn with me to the book of 1st Samuel chapter 24 first Samuel chapter 24.

Let me start this morning by asking you a question. I really want you to think of an answer to this when I ask you want you to have something in your mind. What do you want out of life? What is one thing that if you could change anything about your life, what would it be?

Maybe for you, it would be to have more money a better job Financial Freedom. Maybe for you at your stage of life. It would be to be in a relationship with someone maybe for you and your stage of life. It would be healing some kind of disease or sickness for you or someone that you love if you could change anything about your life, it would be that maybe for you. It's in school. And so maybe just passing the STAAR test or you know that bully who's picking on you at school that that would be just done maybe got would take care of them in Smite them a little bit, you know just a little not too much but just a little you know, whatever it is for most of us. We all have something that if we could change something I live and we would change it right. Can you think of something? That was the case for guy named Thomas and I have two before I tell you about Thomas. I just have to ask this question. What if you had an opportunity to potentially get everything in life that you wanted? Would you take it? I'm outside again. What if you had an opportunity to get everything that you wanted in life to solve all of your problems, would you take it? Because this was a situation that was placed before Thomas. Let me tell you a little bit about Thomas Thomas is a young handsome. 20-something guy got a good job would be a great catch. She grew up in a good home a Christian Home Thomas is the Christian even though most of his friends. Most of the people that he grew up with have left church. Thomas still goes to church Faithfully. He loves Jesus and he wants to serve him with his life. The problem is at Thomas is single he's been single since College. He had a serious girlfriend. Then he thought they were going to get married but things did not work out the way that Thomas at Hope and so for years and years and years Thomas has been single looking for someone to share his life with that. There was one thing that Thomas could change about his life. It would be to find the woman that he is going to marry. He's tried dating. He's tried all these other things until recently a few weeks ago. Thomas met a girl named Kristen on a blind date and she's got everything. She's beautiful. She's smart. She's funny. She's exactly the kind of person that Thomas is looking for they've gone on a few dates and they are hitting it off tremendously. Well, After the 5th date Thomas walks her to the door and they're both thinking at this point that maybe this is the one they both been looking. Maybe this is the one And is Thomas leans in to kiss her goodnight and turns to leave without really thinking about it. Just out of instinct wrist and grabs his hand and turns him around and faces her and says you can stay tonight if you want to.

What would you do? Kiran Thomas shoes What would you do? If life gave you this golden opportunity and that's what it feels like to a young 20-something man. When that happens, I can guarantee you what if life gives you this golden opportunity and you say edit last this is the moment that I have been waiting for and all you have to do is make this one choice.

And there's so much promise and hope that maybe your lonely days are going to be over.

What you do?

She's great. Thomas is excited about the only problem is Thomas is a Christian and he knows that to stay.

Not really the right thing for a Christian. to do Have you ever found yourself in a place where life gives you what we would might refer to as the golden opportunity?

And yet in order to take advantage of that in order to get what you want. There's only one problem. You have to compromise your relationship with God and your integrity. It can happen in so many different ways. It's the exact same thing that happened in the Bible to man named David. She when David was a boy. God had promised him that he would one day grow up to be the next king of Israel. Can you imagine that kind of promised if you were given that promised you would want that one to come true wouldn't you? But when we kind of 1st Samuel chapter 24, and we look at David's life. We see that it doesn't look like that's going to actually happen because you see David has fallen out of favor with the current King a guy name saw and soul. What's the killing? And so David even though he's got a few friends around if he's got an army of about you know, 400 men we see soul is actively hunting and pursuing David in order to try and kill him. David has spent his life running from City to City to place the place and is he goes to a city? The people that City sometimes side was Saul and they sent saw the message saying David is actually here. You can come and kill him yourself. and yet David has to run and Fleet and hide in cave and all of his life is on the run if there was one thing that David could change about his life. It would be this. He want for God to take care of his stall problem. He go back to living his life being friends with Jonathan being married to Saul's daughter being all of these things going back to that position that he had if he could solve one thing if you could just ask for relief, it will be forgot to take care of this and one day. David finds himself in that moment with the golden opportunity. Read With Me In First Samuel chapter 24 verse 1

After Saul returned from pursuing the Philistines he was told David is in the desert of engedi. You see everywhere that David went so had spies and people who were on his side telling him trying to Curry favor with the King, you know, David's over here come and find him. So tall saw took 3000 able young men from all Israel and set out to look for David and his men are the Crags of the wild goats. He came to the Sheep pens along the way a cave was there and saw went in to relieve himself. No notice what it says next David and his men were far back in the cave. It's at this moment when David has to feel like he is the luckiest man in the entire world and I want to explain to you why this area of Israel where David is is a very rocky place. In fact, if you see it's near the Dead Sea Valley and you know, the Dead Sea Valley is the lowest point in the the region around there, but there are cliffs in the desert around there any of these Cliffs there are hundreds of caves and there are tons and tons of case many many places to hide. Incidentally there were many caves. That's all could have chick pick to go in and use the restroom and yet He pick the very cave that David and his men were hiding it. And so Saul goes into this cave unbenounced that his enemy is all the way in the back of this cave. He goes in to use the restroom. So he goes and he has to take off his armor. Take off these things to make himself completely vulnerable. It's as if David has been handed his enemy in a basket with a gift wrap on it with a beautiful bow. Here you go David here is your enemy Saul. It's not surrounded by his 3000 men. David has a free shot. What are you taking? How do you explain something like this taking place? Some people say? Oh, well, it's just a coincidence. I don't really believe in coincidence. David's men interpret it. They say this is a total God thing God is the one who is let this happen God is the one who is brought your enemy to you David. Look at what it says in chapter 24 verse for the men said, this is the day the Lord spoke of you when he said to you I will give your enemy into your hands for you to deal with as you wish.

Now here's the problem with what the mean of said. We actually have no record of God ever actually saying that. Don't we do that we find ourselves in these kind of situations like to put words in God's mouth and make him out to say something that he never actually said in the first place. That's what I do. They say the only explanation David. We don't believe in coincidence either. The only explanation is that God wants you to kill Saul and that is why he is brought him here to you. Let me just let's just pause for a moment. What if there is another explanation? I don't believe in coincidence either. But I also don't believe that God is the only being in this universe who has an interest in arranging our lives for his own purposes.

I don't know what you hear what you think about when you hear someone talk about the devil. The devil is an idea in our culture that has since been seriously either mocked or or for lack of a better term demon eyes and he is a demon but you know what we'll get there. You know what I'm saying? The devil has either been mocked pictured as a a guy walking around in red tights with horns and a pitchfork and a forked tail.

Or he's been highly dramatized in movies like The Exorcist where you know, someone is possessed and spitting up P soup and their head spinning around and it's just kind of a horrifying kind of deal.

You might think that you would know when the devil was at work or when he was active in your life. You might think that would be pretty easy to recognize because somebody would be spitting pea soup and the other half will be spinning around. But the Bible says that the devil works a lot differently the devil is actually can call the accuser. He is called the slanderer. He is called a liar. Jesus tells us in John chapter 8 that he is not the liar and the father of Lies. And what he does what the devil is so effective at doing is convincing people. I believe lies and he's very very good at his job.

You might think you could recognize him at work. But what if we just read the second Corinthians chapter 11 is the devil masquerades as an angel of Light, so when he comes to you To convince you of a lie. He's going to give you something that looks good. Much the same way that if those of you who fished you cast a lure out there, you're going to want to cast something that's going to attract the fish to your hook something that's going to look like food something that's going to draw them in your not going to throw something out there that looks ugly or scary or anything else because you're trying to trap them you're trying to hook them. The devil is doing the same thing to you and to me every single day.

And when an opportunity like this comes to our door. We have to ask yourself who is on the other side?

the cast for David and for his men, this is the Trap. This is a Temptation This is the lie that the devil is trying to sell David David. God wants you to kill Saul

it seems right.

Is it?

What everybody to pay close attention to this next statement? Cuz it's riding my sermon. This is just something that God just hit me hard with and I feel like everybody needs to hear. too often we judge God's will. by our circumstances rather than by his work Too often. We judge God's Will by our circumstances rather than by his word. If things are going our way and our circumstances are pleasurable, and we have these kind of opportunities then God must be happy at us and you must be smiling.

But if we find ourselves in difficulties, if we find ourselves running from our enemies if we find ourselves sickness disease if we find ourselves in the place where we don't want the God must be angry at us for some reason that is not the truth church. That's not the truth.

Because when we look to God's word. We begin to cut through the circumstances and see them in a different way. David's men are saying this has got to be God.

But it's not.

This is not God's opportunity and when Opportunity Knocks in our life. We need to know who's on the other side of the door before we answer.

We've all been in this kind of situation before.

Maybe you knew you shouldn't have got involved with that person. Maybe there were people in your life were concerned about you who loved you who said, you know, I'm not really sure that this is the best person for you, but we wouldn't listen. And we saw our opportunity to end our loneliness and we jumped. We took the plunge.

Ever many of us didn't work out the way that we helped.

Maybe your problem is a little bit different. Maybe you knew you shouldn't have bought that thing or gone on that vacation or spent that money, but it was such a good deal and it was on sale and you really thought it would make you happy and so you jumped and you bought and you went on that trip, and now you're just left with a big pile of death that you don't know if you will ever be able to pay off. you're going to

we know you shouldn't have gone to that party. But you didn't want everybody to think that you would chickened out. You didn't want people at school to talk about you behind your back. And so you went anyways.

There are so many ways that we can find ourselves presented with opportunities that look good. That we really want to take but we know that we shouldn't and that's where David is David has been tempted by this idea. I think is David. If you see at the end of verse 4, it says that he begins to creep towards Saul in the cave as David is creeping toward salt I can imagine he is wrestling with this. I can imagine that he really did want to kill Saul after all so had tried to kill David many times and he was still trying to kill him. And if their positions would have been reversed and so probably would have killed David in this instance.

What is David is clock crawling towards? is anime

we don't know how he was able to see through the lies of the enemy, but I believe it's simply this because David knew.

David had a relationship with God.

I knew his work.

UC Church

We try to make it through this life on our own wisdom our own intellect our own vision. As if we can clearly see problems and clearly know how to handle any and every situation.

There are a lot of confusing things that are going to come at you in this life. That's why the Bible says that God's word is a lamp for our feet and a light for our path in those times when we don't know where to turn in to toast times when we don't know where to stay at where it's safe because everything around us is kind of dark and we don't know what to do. God's word gives us guidance it steers. I straight it helps us to see the difference between the lies of the enemy and the truth of God and I wonder is David was in that cave crawling towards his enemy and he was wrestling with this and he really wanted to kill his enemy if it was God's word that came to him in that moment where he remembered gods were in The Ten Commandments Thou shalt not murder

and in that moment that David remember those words, I wonder if that's when he realized. No, this is not right. And this is not God telling me to do this. This is coming from the enemy. David reaches out his weapon toward song. but instead of running him through he takes his weapon and he cuts off a corner of Saul's robe. And he goes back to his men and look at what it says in verse 5. Afterward David was conscience-stricken for having cut off a corner of his row. They would just he did a little thing. He didn't think he could have killed him. He didn't go the whole way but he was even conscious ticket for that. He said I shouldn't have even done that. He said to his men over 60 the Lord forbid that I should do such a thing to my master. The Lord's anointed or lay my hand on him for he is the anointed of the Lord with these words David sharply rebuked his men and did not allow them to attack soul and Saul left the cave and went on his way David let him go.

Whenever we are faced with an opportunity of the enemy, it is also an opportunity of God. It is an opportunity to trust God. They continue to be faithful to him. Even when we don't understand how he is going to solve our problem. We learn by looking at David story that yes, he would one day be king and the reality is there is no guarantee that if David had killed saw that that would have been a way for David to become king when you think about it. Whenever we see this kind of opportunities in our heart is drawn towards something whenever the devil tempts Us in this way. We often think about we have to picture about how perfect it's going to be and how happy these things are going to make us but we rarely ever think about the downside of those decisions. But maybe we should maybe we should step back and think what's going to happen. If I actually do this, what is the cost who is David's best friend at this time? Is Jonathan? Who is Jonathan? Jonathan was Saul's son and heir to the throne had David killed Saul and walked out of that cave with a crown on his head. I mean, it's almost poetic rights all goes in he dies and then the David goes out and we picture that, you know, I do this and I walk out with a crown on my head and then everybody lives happily ever after that accepts all because he's dead but you know, that's that's how we picture it. and yet

there's no guarantee that that would have happened. There's no guarantee that if David had come out after killing saw that the men would have accepted him as

There's no guarantee that things are going to work out the way that we think it's going to work out we are not in control. God is And in those moments, he's asking us to trust.

God loves you.

But there will be times.

But that love is not going to feel like love. There will be times. When God is going to let you walk through a season of pain. hardship of lack

or you don't feel like enough for you don't have enough where you are going through something that you didn't ask for and something this is the world that we live in.

And in those moments the devil is always going to tempt you to jump ship to turn around to stop trusting in God.

And the decision to trust God is going to have some cost as well by letting his enemy go David is going to be on the run for several more years before God will fulfill his promise.

But if in order to get what you want, you have to compromise your relationship with God, which is the most important thing to anyone.

and passed that opportunity by

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Because it's the diamond set in our class this morning. all of God's promises

Have a great and happy endings. even if the way there is filled with pain in the end it will be Worth it.

You remember Thomas from our opening story?

Like David he really wanted to stay with his girlfriend tonight.

He could picture his his buddies at work.

Telling him that he would be crazy not to and patting him on the back. If you did way to go man. It's awesome.

What would you decide if you were in his shoes?

If he says no he could offend her and he could lose this potentially good thing and go back to being lonely Thomas for a while.

What would you do?

I really don't have to ask you because you been in Thomas's shoes before maybe not in that same situation.

but in others did you make the right decision if you did that's that's wonderful. It's commendable. but if you didn't I don't want you to give up hope. Because the truth is that we've all been in this kind of situation and we have all made the wrong choices time and time again, the Bible teaches us the gospel teaches us. That all have sinned and fallen short of God's glory. We have all fallen in Temptation. We have all made the wrong choice multiple times. But instead of abandoning us in our sin in our Rebellion. God sent his son Jesus to this world.

where as you and I are tempted in many ways Jesus God's son was tempted to In Matthew chapter 4 he goes out into the desert and he's been fasting for 40 days and the Devil tempt him three times in the last temptation. He takes Jesus up to a mountain top and he shows him all the kingdoms of the world and all of their Splendor and the devil tells Jesus. I will give you everything. I will give you everything if you will just Bow Down and Worship me just compromise in this one little thing. Just give up your relationship with God because if you continue to trust God, you know where you're going if you were going to cross and why in the world, would you trust God if he is going to send you there? So avoid all that cross stuff? What does sacrifice avoid the pain avoid the hurt and just trust me? worship me I'll give it to you.

Whereas you and I often make the wrong choices when we are tempted Jesus never did. He lived his entire Earthly life completely obedient to God. He was obedient as a child as a teenager. He was obedient as an adult.

He never said once. And though he was innocent God sent him to the cross and he willingly went to the Cross to die for your Disobedience and my Disobedience for the times that we failed.

And because of his love for us.

He not only offers us forgiveness for our past in Christ Jesus. But he offers has hope for the future you say you can't go back and undo the decisions that you made all the regrets of your past. You can't do it. There's no point in trying but God can not only take that and redeem it but he can give you a brand-new future if you will trust in him and that's my prayer for you is my prayer for me. And we would trust in him.

If you don't know the hope of Salvation in Jesus Christ the Forgiveness of sins and hope for a new future strength to live and walk with him each and every day. I encourage you to talk to somebody talk to me talk to one of the elders. You can make the decision to trust price today in baptism.

Every nothing more nothing more would make us happier.

If you messed up. If you sent even though you have been saved you confess your sin. You repent you turn back to God. And you will find grace and mercy to help you in your time of need.

But there is nothing more important in your life and your relationship with God. So do not sacrifice that for any opportunity because here's the thing about the enemy he likes to make things look good up front, but he over promises and he under delivers. He does not want you to be happy. He comes to steal kill and destroy and we have all experienced the consequences of that. God is the only one who will lead us to True Joy true. Peace your happiness.

So let's trust in him.

Don't open the door when Opportunity Knocks until you know. Who's on the other side?

Heavenly father. I thank you for your words. Thank you for your grace in Jesus Christ without it. We would all be lost. Can I pray that you would start our hearts Now show us how we can respond to these words that you've spoken. And I pray that you would help us to see that you are a golden opportunity and nothing else that if we have you. Bok

Help us to believe it. Strengthen our faith in the times when we feel weak help us to get through and to escape the temptation of the enemy so that we can live Faithfully for you.

and draw closer to you each and every day all of this in Jesus name Hey, man, would you stand with me Church?

Max going to come up and he's going to lead us in one more song If you here today and you need prayer for anything, it doesn't have to be related to what I said. I encourage you to come forward we have to pray with you. May the Lord bless and keep you charged.